Captain Erdogan And The E.U. Storm
BY MURAT YETKIN
Turkish Press
June 28 2005
RADIKAL- It’s as if a psychological war had begun. It’s as if every
day somebody was trying to find new issues to irritate Turkey and
make Ankara abandon its EU membership aspirations. Yesterday it was
French Interior Minister Nicholas Sarkozy’s turn. After Bulgaria
and Romania join the EU, he said, the enlargement process should
be suspended. He implicitly meant that Turkey and Croatia should be
excluded from the bloc.
Doesn’t Sarkozy know that his words have no legal bearing? Isn’t
he aware that stopping Turkey’s EU membership bid would require a
unanimous decision by 25 member countries? Or doesn’t German opposition
leader Angela Merkel know that the process can’t be reversed? Don’t
these French and German politicians know that Turkey’s negotiations
will be open-ended? So why do they feel the need to reiterate it
so often?
Now the debate about Turkey’s membership bid is focused on the
framework document. The draft text will be distributed to the members
of the EU Commission tomorrow. We know that the document includes
some sensitive points that could bother Ankara, such as the Armenian
and Cyprus issues.
We can summarize the current situation as follows:
The EU is no longer in favor of enlargement. Feeling deflated by
the latest developments, Turks are finding it hard to keep their EU
hopes alive.
So things are getting more difficult. Under these circumstances,
Turkey should stay calm and act with common sense. Yesterday,
before his departure for Yemen, Foreign Ministry Abdullah Gul
reiterated Ankara’s official policy of continuing reforms no matter
what happens. Ankara knows that it shouldn’t let itself be rattled
by negative statements from European figures. Under the current
conditions, we should maintain this position. We should not give
ammunition to the anti-Turkish circles.
It is Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, above all, who should keep
steady nerves. He should control his temper and be a model of good
leadership. ‘The skills of a captain can only be seen during a storm,’
as he always says.
Here is our captain, and here is a storm.