EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT SET TO VOTE ON TURKEY REPORT
NTV MSNBC, Turkey
Sept 27 2006
There has been widespread criticism of the report in Ankara, much of
it focusing on efforts to add new conditions to Turkey’s EU accession
requirements.
Guncelleme: 12:23 TSÝ 27 Eylul 2006 CarþambaSTRASBOURG – The European
Parliament is to vote on a report prepared by Dutch centre-right MEP
Camiel Eurlings on Turkey’s progress towards meeting the membership
criteria of the European Union Wednesday.
The report says that there has been a slowing down of Turkey’s efforts
to meet the accession requirements of the EU, and is critical of
the some elements of the Turkish government’s program to implement
legislative reforms set out by the bloc for membership. However,
it is expected that some amendments to the original report, added
by members of the European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee,
will be dropped from the final document before it is voted on.
These include a requirement for Ankara to accept that the Ottoman
Empire committed an act of genocide against its Armenian citizens
during the First World War. Turkey has always denied such an event
took place. Eurlings’ report stresses that Turkey must do more to
strengthen freedom of expression and minority religion rights and
work to find a resolution to the dispute on the island of Cyprus.
–Boundary_(ID_VCZg+jrQLgNnu3EVnpntjQ)–