EU TO MEET ANGRY TURKEY FOR PROGRESS REVIEW
Al-Arab online, UK
Oct 16 2006
Turkey meets the European Union to review tense relations on Monday,
embittered after French lawmakers passed a bill making it a crime to
deny that Ottoman Turks committed genocide against Armenians in 1915.
Although not formally on the agenda of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul’s
talks in Luxembourg, anger over the French vote seems bound to dominate
the regular session with the 25-nation bloc’s biggest candidate.
The EU, represented by the Finnish and German foreign ministers and
European Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn, will press Ankara again
to open its ports to shipping from EU-member Cyprus to avoid a possible
freeze in entry negotiations.
But European diplomats say the French move, even if it seems unlikely
to become law, made it almost impossible for the Turkish government to
make any concession over Cyprus before elections next year, despite
Finnish diplomatic efforts.
Rehn called last Thursday’s Paris vote "counter-productive" both
for efforts to reconcile Turks and Armenians and for moves to reform
Turkey’s penal code to increase freedom of expression.
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was quoted on Sunday as saying
French President Jacques Chirac had telephoned him to apologise and
promise help in heading off the bill.
But the row has fuelled Turkish nationalist arguments that the
Europeans do not really want Turkey as a member, thus it is pointless
to make concessions on Cyprus, Kurdish rights, religious minorities
or ties with Armenia to please Brussels.
Finnish Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja is trying to craft a mini-deal
to ease trade ties on Cyprus.
Turkey does not recognize the Greek Cypriot government in Nicosia,
which represents the divided island in the EU.
The executive European Commission issues its next progress report on
Turkey’s candidacy on November 8.
It is likely to conclude that the EU-driven reform process has slowed
and Ankara has not met its treaty obligations on Cyprus.
That could prompt EU leaders at a mid-December summit to freeze or
slow the entry negotiations.
The British ambassador to Turkey, Peter Westmacott, said if the Finnish
move fails, the EU will hold Turkey to account for not meeting its
commitments with the risk that the accession process — at least in
part — would be suspended.
"That would be dangerous. The negotiations, once stalled, would be
very hard to re-start," he wrote in an opinion piece published in
Turkish Daily News on Monday.
Cyprus is using its EU veto to block the opening of any new "chapter"
or policy area in talks with Turkey.
Cypriot Foreign Minister Georgios Lillikas said his government would
not budge from its position of no new negotiations without a move
by Turkey.
"Cyprus is not in a position to open or close chapters or set
benchmarks," he said in an interview with German newspaper Financial
Times Deutschland.
"We are firmly determined to pursue this path because any further
concession to Turkey only serves to undermine the EU’s legitimacy."
The EU will review troubled relations with another long-term aspirant
to membership later on Monday in talks with Serbian Prime Minister
Vojislav Kostunica.
Brussels broke off talks on closer ties with Belgrade in May after
Kostunica failed to make good on a promise to arrest and hand over
former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic for trial in The
Hague on genocide charges.
Chief U.N. war crimes prosecutor Carla Del Ponte is expected to tell
the EU troika at Monday’s talks that Serbia is still not cooperating
fully with her tribunal.