BREAKDOWN OVER THE BOSPHORUS
Ian Traynor
The Guardian, UK
Nov 6 2006
To bring Turkey in would be a heroic move by Europe. To reject it
could be construed as a concession to fear and pessimism.
About Webfeeds November 6, 2006 05:42 PM | Printable version To let
Turkey into the European Union? One helluva problem, no doubt about
it. And keeping the Turks out? An even bigger problem, perhaps?
Damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
The bad-tempered sparring that has characterised the EU’s negotiations
with Ankara since Brussels gave the go-ahead for membership talks
last year is shifting into a more perilous phase, propelled by quite
separate dynamics on both sides.
In Europe a panoply of diffuse factors are combining to wreck Turkey’s
chances. Islamophobia, European dilemmas over how to integrate or
exclude the growing Muslim minorities in their societies, paralysis
and indecision among EU political elites about how to revive the
European project, "expansion fatigue" as the EU grows to encompass 27
countries. There is a broad mood of drift, clueless and helpless. At
a time like this, who needs or wants Turkey?
On the other side of the Bosphorus, the grievances are great and
growing. A big proud nation is being antagonised and humiliated on
an almost weekly basis. Prickly to a fault, Turkey is less inclined
to do the EU’s bidding the more it is ordered to.
This week the European Commission will take Ankara to task on a whole
host of issues. A couple of weeks ago it was the French parliament
sitting in judgment of Turkish history, seeking to criminalise denial
of the Turks "genocide" of the Armenians in 1915.
The Brussels report card on Wednesday goes much further than a
ticking off or "could do much better". The class teacher in Brussels
is severely reprimanding the Turks for lagging behind on everything
from military interference in politics to free speech curbs to
women’s rights to corruption and police brutality. And then there’s
Cyprus. Turkey? Not very European at all, concludes the report card.
When the report goes to the head teacher at an EU summit in December,
the pupil, if not expelled from school, may find himself suspended
from class. And if that happens, the damage could be immense.
Turkey is already in an election season. A new president has to be
voted on by next May and parliamentary elections held by the end of
next year. Nationalism, militant secularism, and moderate Islamism are
all forces on the rise and being played out as the prime minister,
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, struggles to keep Turkey’s European vocation
alive.
The constant hectoring tone from the EU hardly helps him.
Recalcitrance in response to the routine criticisms, particularly from
France, Germany, and Austria, also make it difficult and politically
risky for Mr Erdogan to equate Turkey’s modernisation with its
"Europeanisation." Both sides are digging in their heels.
There is no denying the scale of the problem, the dilemma, or the
opportunity. Although it cannot happen for at least a decade, for
the EU to let Turkey join would be a mammoth step. The country of
more than 70 million would be bigger than Germany by the time of
entry, meaning that a Muslim country would instantly become the EU’s
biggest. For the Vatican and for the Christian democrats of Europe
(and not a few social democrats as well) this is a leap too far,
hence the current unsuccessful attempt by centre-right governments in
Europe to try to get the EU commission to define the EU’s "absorption
capacity" – in plain English, Europe’s territorial limits.
Furthermore, under the new voting system likely to be revived at
some stage despite the moribund condition of the EU’s constitution,
Germany’s status as the EU’s biggest member is recognised by giving
it enhanced voting clout. If fairness were to prevail, Turkey would
automatically have the biggest say in EU councils. And, with the
biggest Nato army this side of the Atlantic, Turkey would also
instantly become Europe’s foremost military.
Again, if fairness were to prevail, Turkey’s size and relative poverty
would entitle it to a huge share of EU funds such as to make current
squabbling over budgets and farm subsidies seem paltry. A great unsung
success of the EU over the years has been the smooth redistribution of
wealth to, say, Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, and now to eastern
and central Europe. Will the generosity extend to Turkey?
If these are just a few of the major problems of letting Turkey in,
what about keeping it out? Europe would willy-nilly be confirmed as
a Christian bastion of anti-Muslim prejudice. It would demonstrate
it is not up to seizing the grand, historic, strategic opportunity
of integrating and consolidating a large Muslim democracy.
There would inevitably be hell to pay. Geographically and historically,
Turkey is a pivotal power, straddling and connecting Europe and the
Middle East. Rejection would tip Turkey towards the Middle East,
push Turkey away from the west and towards authoritarian historical
enemies such as Russia and Iran, vindicate "clash of civilisation"
pessimists, strengthen anti-democratic Islamists and nationalists. To
bring Turkey in would be an uncharacteristically heroic move by Europe,
ringing with promise, opportunity, and optimism. To reject it could
be construed as cowardice, a concession to fear and pessimism. Either
way, the choices, still a long way off, are damnably hard.
But if not dishonest, there is something fundamentally depressing
about the Turkey-EU negotiations which, only a year after the formal
go-ahead for the talks, have degenerated into a dialogue of the deaf
and look to be heading towards breakdown.
The Turks have an uncanny aptitude for shooting themselves in the
foot, arming their critics and opponents whether by putting their most
celebrated writer (as well as many others) on trial for speaking his
mind or charging dozens of ethnic Kurdish mayors with offences for
asking Denmark to keep a Kurdish TV station on the air. And in Europe,
governments and leading politicians repeatedly state that Turkey will
never join. They then devise mechanisms to ensure that Turkey is kept
out just after those same governments and leaders at a European summit
have launched negotiations designed to bring Turkey in.
Rather than a courtship that is looking forward to a happy wedding,
the relationship over the past year has been more like grumpy divorce
proceedings, with the estranged partners making peremptory demands
of one another and always looking to blame the other. It is a strange
way to prepare for a marriage.
_traynor/2006/11/breakdown_over_the_bosphorus.html