The Globe and Mail (Canada)
January 1, 2007 Monday

EDITORIAL; Pg. A10

Turkey and the EU

Turkey became an associate member of the European Common Market in
1963. It applied for full membership in the European Union in 1987.
It was recognized as an official candidate in 1999 and entered
membership talks in 2005. It has been banging on Europe’s door for at
least a generation, yet even optimists say it will take another 10
years to get past the doorstep. Is it any wonder the Turks are
getting impatient?

The latest rebuff came last month when the EU suspended talks with
Ankara on eight of the 35 policy areas they are discussing. The
purported reason was Turkey’s refusal to open its ports and airports
to Cyprus, an EU member that Ankara does not recognize because of the
long-running dispute between Greek and Turkish inhabitants of the
island. The Turks say the issue is a smokescreen, covering up
Europe’s growing reluctance to bring a mainly Muslim nation into a
club dominated by countries of Christian heritage.

They have a point. Europe’s doubts have been growing steadily
stronger. Partly because of worries about restive, unassimilated
Muslim minorities in many EU countries, Europeans are wondering
whether it really makes sense to take a big, poor, Muslim nation into
the family. Angela Merkel, the conservative Chancellor of Germany,
has been a skeptic on Turkey’s entry since she came to office a year
ago. She pushed last month to give Ankara a deadline to meet its
obligations on trade with Cyprus, but failed to get the measure
through. Nicolas Sarkozy, the French Interior Minister who is a
leading candidate to become President of France in May’s election, is
an open opponent of Turkish EU membership. Among Europe’s Big Three –
Germany, France and Britain – only British Prime Minister Tony Blair
is an enthusiastic supporter of bringing Turkey in.

Turkey has itself to blame for much of Europe’s growing skepticism.
Though Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has taken great strides to
reform the country – reducing the military’s role in politics,
extending language and education rights to minority Kurds, opening up
the economy to more competition and trying to modernize the legal
system – there are many signs that Turkey still does not understand
what it takes to be a truly modern, European nation.

Dozens of writers, including Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk, have
been prosecuted for the dubious crime of insulting the nation. The
country has still failed to confront ugly episodes in its past, such
as the Armenian genocide. A mood of nationalism and anti-Americanism
is taking hold (though the United States backs Turkish entry into the
EU). With parliamentary and presidential elections coming up this
year, politicians may be tempted to wave the flag and stomp their
feet in a way that would further alienate European opinion. Turkey
cannot seriously expect to be embraced by Europe while trying to
throw writers in jail for speaking their minds. If there is a
baseline for acceptance into the European family, the right of free
expression should be it.

For all that, the arguments for Turkish membership remain strong.
Turkey is a strategic asset, lying at the crossroads of Europe and
the Middle East. It has been a loyal member of the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization. Most important, it is one of the few democratic
countries in the Muslim world, maintaining a secular government while
most its citizens remain faithfully Islamic. As such, it is a golden
example to the other Islamic countries of how they can be modern and
Muslim at the same time. In a period when the U.S.-led attempt to
promote democracy in the Middle East is faltering, that is a crucial
message to send. Welcomed into the EU, Turkey could become a bridge
between the Islamic and Western worlds. Rejected by the EU, it could
drift into the Islamic radicalism and bitter anti-Western nationalism
that infects so many of its Middle Eastern cousins. Muslims
everywhere would be confirmed in their belief that while the West
talks a good line about harmony between civilizations, it still
doesn’t want a Muslim at the family table.

Yes, Turkey must do more – much more – to prove its fitness for
European membership. But Europe must keep its eye on the prize that
Turkey represents: a partnership between Islam and the West that
would be a lesson to the world.