EU parliament says Turkey must recognise "genocide"

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DAILY MAIL (London)
September 30, 2005

EU REBELLION COULD SLAM DOOR ON TURKS

by BENEDICT BROGAN. POLITICAL EDITOR


TONY Blair's European presidency was under strain last night after
Britain was forced to call an eleventh-hour crisis summit on Turkey's
entry to the EU.

Austria yesterday threatened to scupper the whole process by holding
out for Turkey to be offered an alternative to full membership,
something rejected by Ankara as 'second class'.

It forced Britain to call a meeting of EU foreign ministers in
Luxembourg on Sunday to try and break the deadlock.

Landmark accession talks with Turkey are due to begin the following
day.

Mr Blair has championed Turkey's entry as an example of the West's
positive engagement with the Muslim world at a time of heightened
tension, and the failure of talks to get off the ground would be a
devastating blow to his presidency.

Mounting grassroots opposition to Turkish membership in several
countries has jeopardised the whole accession process, which would
see the EU expand beyond Europe's historical frontiers.

Polls show 80 per cent of the Austrian electorate opposes the move.

In France the public is overwhelmingly opposed, causing President
Jacques Chirac to pledge a referendum on the issue. Likely German
chancellor Angela Merkel is firmly against Turkey joining.

Public opposition was fuelled this week by accusations that mental
health patients in Turkey have been subjected to serious abuses,
including the use of electric shock treatment without anaesthesia.

Several countries have also been pushing Turkey to recognise EU
member Cyprus, and the European Parliament this week called on it to
recognise the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks at the beginning
of the 20th century as genocide.

Yesterday, ambassadors were unable to agree even a negotiating
framework for the accession talks - which themselves are expected to
take ten years.

Turkey's foreign minister Abdullah Gul said that his country will not
send its delegation to Luxembourg for talks on Monday unless his
officials have seen the details of the EU's negotiating positions.

'Of course there is a possibility that negotiations will not start,'
he said.

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The Independent (London)
September 30, 2005, Friday

LEADING ARTICLE: ACCESSION TALKS MUST GO AHEAD;
TURKEY


It didn't rate a mention in his speech to the Labour Party
conference, although it did produce an impassioned plea from his
Foreign Secretary in Brighton. But Turkey's application for
membership of the European Union is likely to be the first major test
of Tony Blair's presidency of the EU. And a crucial challenge to his
and Jack Straw's powers of persuasion.

The UK has always been strongly in favour of accession talks with
Turkey, and rightly so. If the Union is to keep expanding to its
geographic and historic shape, if it is to act as a catalyst for
democratic change in the surrounding regions, and if it is to prove a
means of bringing Islam into cohabitation with the Christian West,
then there could be no better candidate for inclusion than Turkey. It
straddles the straits between East and West, it has a strong secular
and pro-Western tradition dating from the time of Kemal Ataturk, it
has been a stalwart member of Nato alongside the Western European
countries, and it has made a clear policy decision and started on the
steps necessary to join the Union.

A year ago the road seemed fairly straight and even. The Commission
was in favour, most of the member states had expressed approval and,
with a final meeting of the EU foreign ministers next Monday, a start
to negotiations (expected to last 10 years, it should be added) would
be under way.

All that has now been jeopardised by growing dissension in the
European Parliament, the open opposition of Angela Merkel in Germany
and Nicolas Sarkozy in France, and now the Austrian refusal to go
along with a vote in favour at the meeting of permanent
representatives of the member states this week. An emergency meeting
of foreign ministers has been called in Luxembourg on Sunday in a
last-ditch effort to save the talks.

Agreement will be far from easy. Quite aside from the thorny issues
of Turkish responsibility for the Armenian massacres and its refusal
to recognise Cyprus, there is Austria's last-minute demand that
Turkey be offered partnership rather than full membership " a
suggestion which Turkey indignantly and understandably refuses as
changing the rules of the game at the last moment.

The real worry is that time is slipping away from these talks.
Opposition to Turkish membership is building in the Union, while
nationalist antagonism to Europe's prevarications and changes of mind
is rising in Turkey. If negotiations are to proceed, then the
timetable has to be kept. If ever there was a time for Tony Blair to
exercise his undoubted skills of charm and persuasion, it is now.
Otherwise an historic opportunity may be lost, with incalculable
effect on future relations with the Muslim world.

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EIU European Voice
September 29, 2005 Thursday Turkey

Turkey talks move closer, but MEPs postpone customs deal


The opening of accession negotiations with Turkey moved closer
yesterday (28 September) after the European Parliament backed plans
to start talks next week. But in a serious political blow to Turkey,
MEPs decided to postpone a vote on an EU-Turkey customs agreement, as
a sign of frustration with Ankara's refusal to recognise Cyprus.

MEPs demanded a guarantee that the Turkish parliament, when it
ratifies the extension of the customs union with the EU's ten newest
member states, including Cyprus, will drop the Turkish government's
unilateral declaration that this would not amount to recognition of
Cyprus.

Some MEPs reacted angrily to the decision to postpone approval of the
protocol. Dutch Green deputy Joost Lagendijk, chairman of the
Parliament's Turkey delegation, said: "It sends a very bad signal."

UK Liberal MEP Andrew Duff said: "The decision is short-sighted and
mean-spirited and will particularly affect the ten new member states.
It sows distrust between the two sides and delays the possibility of
relaxing the financial and trade embargo against Turkish North
Cyprus."

The European Commission said that it deplored the Parliament's
decision to withhold approval of the customs protocol, describing it
as "an own goal" for the EU.

The protest was led by the centre-right European People's Party
(EPP-ED) but was supported by a cross-party coalition of MEPs.
Socialist deputy group leader Jan Marinus Wiersma said: "We deplore
the stance Turkey has taken on Cyprus and the way it has cast serious
doubt on its willingness to implement the protocol extending the
Ankara Agreement to the ten new member states." The Socialist leader
Martin Schulz said that Turkey should recognise Cyprus during the
negotiations. "This cannot be at the end of the negotiations. It must
take place immediately, within the first one or two years," he said,
adding that without such recognition, accession talks should be
broken off.

Parliament also said that it considered Turkish recognition of the
Armenian genocide "to be a prerequisite for accession".

During the debate Hans-Gert Pottering, the EPP-ED leader, attacked EU
leaders' tolerant attitude towards Turkey and their tough stance on
Croatia. Talks with Croatia, initially planned to start last March,
have been postponed because of the government's alleged failure to
help bring a war criminal before international justice. The
Socialists' leader hit back accusing Pottering of religious
discrimination: "You don't want Turkey in because it is Islamic and
far away. Croatia is closer and is Catholic," Schulz said.

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Agence France Presse -- English
September 30, 2005 Friday

Turkish press angered, frustrated by EU deadlock

ANKARA

Turkish newspapers Friday wondered whether the country's decades-old
efforts to integrate Europe are going down the drain as simmering
tensions on the eve of Turkey's accession talks appear to exasperate
even the staunchest proponents of EU membership.

In a front-page "Historical Warning" to the European Union, the
mass-selling daily Sabah appealed to European leaders to leave aside
domestic political concerns and clear the way for membership talks
with Ankara, scheduled to start on Monday.

"We hope EU leaders, politicians and bureaucrats will realize the
gravity of the situation," Sabah said. "It is not too late to return
to common sense."

Newspapers highlighted a warning by Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul
that he would not go to Luxembourg for the opening of the talks if
the accession terms the EU outlines are unsatisfactory and Ankara is
presented with any last-minute offer other than full membership.

Tensions mounted Thursday when the EU failed to agree on Turkey's
negotiating conditions and called an emergency meeting for Sunday,
leaving Ankara on the edge and doubtful of the pledges the EU made at
its December 17 summit inviting Turkey to begin accession talks.

The deadlock in the EU was blamed on Austria's insistence to offer
Turkey "partnership" as opposed to full membership.

"Are we nearing the end of the road?" asked the pro-government Yeni
Safak, while the popular Aksam said relations were teetering "on the
brink of a breakdown."

The liberal Milliyet said the European Parliament threw "yet another
bomb" into an already demoralized Turkish public opinion by calling
on Ankara earlier this week to acknowledge that the Ottomans
committed "genocide" against Armenians in World War I as a condition
for accession.

"Is the EU aware that it is playing with fire?" Milliyet said. "Even
supporters of the EU have begun saying that enough is enough."

The newspaper also suggested that Turkey should be prepared for a
"timeout" in its bid to join the bloc "until minds in the EU change
in favor of putting relations with Turkey on the track of full
membership, under equal conditions with the others."

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Associated Press Worldstream
September 30, 2005 Friday 8:53 AM Eastern Time

Chaos ahead of membership talks underscore hesitations about letting
Turkey into EU

by CONSTANT BRAND; Associated Press Writer

BRUSSELS, Belgium

In Austria, a far-right party has plastered walls with the slogan
"Vienna must not become Istanbul!" Polls show that not one EU country
has a majority who support Turkey's membership bid. Turks themselves
are wondering if it's all worth the effort.

As chaos swirls over last-minute obstacles set up by Austria,
Turkey's hopes of one day joining the EU - or even of starting
negotiations Monday as planned - are increasingly in doubt.

The opening ceremony in Luxembourg - replete with champagne toasts,
handshakes and a celebratory dinner - has been a moment Turkey has
coveted for over four decades. But Austria's sudden insistence that
the EU offer Turkey a lesser partnership instead of full membership
has thrown the process into disarray.

Diplomats were scrambling to achieve a breakthrough Friday, as Turkey
threatened to keep its delegation home until it saw a document
outlining exactly what it would be negotiating for.

The Austrian position may reflect a growing resistance on the
continent to welcoming a poor, mainly Muslim nation whose population
is soon set to overtake the 80 million of Europe's largest nation,
Germany.

"I don't think Turkey should join the EU. There's the religion - they
still are quite fanatic - and I don't think Turkey is European
enough. It's more Asian," said Martin Maikisch, a 23-year-old
bookkeeper from the small eastern Austrian town of Guessing.

In London, 42-year-old zoologist Dave Clarke was worried about
extending Europe's borders indefinitely, saying: "I have nothing
against Turkey per se, but the EU has to decide how far it extends.
There has got to be a limit."

Recent surveys across Europe have found a majority of Europeans
oppose Turkish membership. An EU survey published this week found
only 10 percent of Austrians support Turkey's membership, while
support across the 25-nation bloc stood at just 35 percent.

For EU nations struggling with high unemployment and worried they
might have to scuttle time-honored social protections, Turkey was
always going to be a hard sell. But the rejections by France and the
Netherlands of the draft EU constitution have put Europeans in an
even more inward-looking mood.

The stinging repudiations in May and June were largely seen as a cry
of alarm about the bloc's rapid expansion; they have even called into
question of membership for Romania and Bulgaria, which are expected
to join in 2007.

Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen told Danish media this
week that the EU had to heed public concerns. "My overall conclusion
is that we must lower the pace and consolidate the EU," he said.

Advocates of Turkish membership argue that welcoming Turkey would
send a positive signal to the Muslim world and strengthen a crucial
security alliance as Europe confronts the problem of terrorism on its
own soil. The European deadlock threatens to alienate Islamic nations
- fueling bitterness and suspicions that the West isn't willing to
accept Muslims on equal footing.

Turkish newspapers reflected growing anxiety that the EU is about to
break its word. Daily Sabah newspaper devoted its entire front page
Friday to "a historic warning" to EU leaders.

"Does the EU realize that it is playing with fire," wrote daily
Milliyet columnist Hasan Cemal. "There is no end to the dynamites
being thrown" on Turkey's EU path. "They think that the Turkish
public opinion is a stone of patience."

Even if negotiations open on Monday, they will be tough: The EU has
made clear the talks offer "no guarantee" of success and they are
likely to continue for up to 15 years.

Cyprus has raised threats of blocking the talks once they start if
Turkey does not move quickly to recognize the island during the
talks. Nicosia grudgingly backed off from demands earlier this month
that Turkey recognize the EU member before the start of negotiations.

The European Parliament this week added new demands that Turkey
recognize the killing of Armenians by Ottoman Turks at the beginning
of the 20th century as genocide during the talks. And France - where
polls show deep resistance to Turkish membership - has vowed to hold
a referendum on Turkey's bid if negotiations begin.

"Evidently there are cold-feet," said Fadi Hakura, a Turkey
specialist at London's Chatham House think-tank. But he warned that
by rejecting Turkey, the EU "would lose all influence over the
Turkish reforms that Turkey is undergoing at the present."

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EuroNews - English Version
September 29, 2005

EU prevarication affects Turkish membership enthusiasm

Rising nationalist sentiment in Turkey is accompanying the
reservations expressed in Europe towards whether the Union can
successfully take the vast mostly Muslim country of 70 million
people. Pro-European Radikal newspaper said 'Europe is stretching
patience to the limit'.

Readers discovered what looked like a new pre-condition: The European
Parliament demanding that Turks recognize as genocide the mass
killing of Armenians 90 years ago.

Turkish support for joining the EU has fallen from 73 percent a year
ago to 63 percent in a recent survey. Establishment and army pride in
the modern Turkey forged by Kemal Ataturk, still a hero for most
Turks, remains strong. Yet reformers insist that to transform a
Kemalist state into a democracy respecting individuals the EU
provides the way.

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Kathimerini, Greece
Oct 1 2005

An EU stretched too far
By Petros Papaconstantinou

The looming collapse of Turkey's EU talks before they have even
started confirms that, for European governments, Ankara's refusal to
recognize Cyprus was merely a pretext used to revise their
wrongheaded strategy. Vienna is once again halting the Sultan at the
gates of Europe - a role that Athens and Nicosia could not afford to
play. But the loose-tongued Austrians do not speak only for
themselves. The recent setback in the European Parliament and French
calls for a `clearly controlled' application process for Turkey
indicate the change of mood.

For how can one explain the shift of big states which - after
pressuring Athens for years to lift its Turkey veto - have now, at
the 11th hour, unearthed the problem of Cyprus, the Kurdish issue,
the Armenian killings, even the cases of torture in Turkey's
psychiatric clinics. In Turkish eyes, that can only be a sign of
growing reluctance to let Ankara hop on the EU train.

What the expanding alliance of Turkey-skeptics fail to see is that
the rushed expansion of the bloc was a blunder of mammoth
proportions. Enlargement was decided in the wake of German
reunification as Berlin reckoned that its unmatched economic leverage
would turn the former socialist countries of Eastern Europe into
satellites. Britain wanted the same thing for different reasons.
Eastward enlargement, it was believed, would put European plans for
political and military emancipation from the US on the back burner
and take the dismantling of Europe's social state a step further.

In the end, it was London, not Berlin, who smiled. In this context,
the clamor over Turkish membership has catapulted onto center stage
the concerns over Europe's geographical stretch, which threatens to
unravel its social and political cohesion.

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Xinhua, China
The People's Daily, China
Oct 1 2005

Turkey expects EU to fulfill duties: FM



Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said Turkey had fulfilled its
responsibilities on the road to the European Union membership,
expecting the EU to do the same and conclude Turkey's entry process
positively.

Gul made the statements as Britain, which currently holds the
six-month rotating EU presidency, has called an emergency meeting of
EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg on Sunday in a bid to end the
bickering over the guiding principles of Turkey's accession talks.

"I cannot say anything definite about whether negotiations will be
opened in a few days. They may or may not be launched," Gul told
reporters late Friday.

Turkey's entry talks are scheduled to start on Oct. 3. EU foreign
ministers must agree on a negotiating mandate for Turkey to begin
talks at the Sunday emergency meeting, less than 24 hours away from
the scheduled negotiation date.

EU member state Austria insists that the ministerial talks aim for a
"privileged partnership" with Turkey instead of full membership.

Ankara rejects any second-class treatment. Gul warned that the
Turkish government did not think Turkey should join the EU in this
case.

"A partnership between the EU and Turkey would not be established if
the EU did not keep its promises, if leaders of the EU member states
forgot they had signed several documents or neglected their
signatures due to some reasons, and if they brought forward new
conditions which could never be accepted by Turkey," said Gul.

"We want to start negotiations, and we are working for this but
within the framework of the realities," Gul added.

The foreign minister also said Turkey had held meetings with leaders
of several EU member states, including Britain.

"I hope that this honest attitude of Turkey will be responded in the
similar way. And the entry process will go in the right track in the
end," he concluded.

EU leaders agreed last December that Turkey had carried out necessary
reforms on human rights, society and economy, which qualify Ankara
for official EU membership talks.

But strains flared anew after Ankara reaffirmed in July its refusal
to recognize the Greek Cypriot government, which joined the EU on
behalf of the whole island. Ankara recognized the breakaway Turkish
Cypriot in the north.

Turkey has also come under pressure to recognize what Armenians call
a genocide against their people by the Ottoman Empire during and at
the end of World War I -- an event that remains highly sensitive for
Turks.

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Kathimerini, Greece
Oct 1 2005

At Turkey's heart, a major paradox


A letter by Turkish Ambassador to Paris Uluc Ozulker that was
published yesterday in the French daily Le Figaro in which he
portrayed Greek Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Vartholomaios, who is
based in Istanbul, as a local religious leader is one more piece of
evidence that our eastern neighbor is far from ready to come under
the European Union roof. Turkey has a long path to tread before
reaching the EU's political and institutional standards. European
political culture is even further away.

The letter by the Turkish envoy pales in comparison to the legal suit
against acclaimed novelist Orhan Pamuk (after his comments about
Turkey's killing of Armenians and Kurds) and the court decision
halting a conference on the Armenian massacre under Ottoman rule. But
the political origins of the incidents are common - they are all
products of Ankara's state ideology. Although clouds are gathering
over Turkey's EU ambitions, Ankara continues to provoke people's
democratic sensitivities. Sure, Turkey is not trying to put
additional obstacles in its path; its reaction is in keeping with its
character - and it is not willing to change mentality and practices.

True, the government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan has taken significant
steps in introducing EU-minded legal reforms. But their
implementation has been sorely lacking. Moreover, Ankara seems more
interested in formalities than in real implementation. It all seems
to boil down to the big paradox at the heart of the Turkish
establishment: Ankara is, on the one hand, in favor of EU membership,
but, on the other, it fears that European principles could also
unmake Turkey.

Caught up in this internal contradiction, Ankara wants membership
without having to adapt. Above all, it insists on seeing itself as a
fortress state. Its diplomatic maneuvering underscores a desire to
join the bloc on its own terms. In short, Turkey wants the rights
without the responsibilities, which demonstrates that the candidate
country is a complete stranger to European political norms.

There is no such thing as Europe a la carte. As time goes by, Turkey
will be faced with an inescapable dilemma. It will either launch the
process that will transform it for good or the enterprise of full
membership will degenerate into a special partnership. Turkey has no
place in the European house unless it remakes itself.

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Washington Times
Oct 1 2005

Turkey wary of EU intentions
By Sibel Utku Bila


ANKARA, Turkey -- Turkey yesterday girded for a showdown with the
European Union as anger and frustration simmered over what Turks see
as European backpedaling on pledges to admit the Muslim country to
the bloc.
With just three days left before the start of membership talks,
EU countries were still wrangling over accession terms for Turkey,
leaving Ankara on edge and its decades-old dream of integrating with
Europe shrouded in uncertainty.
Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul said he would not go to Luxembourg
for the start of the talks Monday if Ankara is dissatisfied with the
EU's conditions.
"Undoubtedly, there is the risk of not starting membership
talks," Mr. Gul conceded late Thursday. "We are facing serious
problems."
In an 11th-hour bid for a breakthrough, the EU will hold an
emergency meeting of foreign ministers tomorrow to seek a compromise
on a negotiating framework -- the guiding procedures and principles
for the talks with Turkey.
The deadlock is blamed on Austria's insistence to offer Turkey
"privileged partnership" as an alternative to full membership, an
option Ankara flatly rejects.
Mr. Gul said he would not board the plane for Luxembourg before
seeing the final document, but remained hopeful of a compromise
despite the time pressure.
Turkey has been trying to join the EU since the 1960s, but its
place in Europe has come increasingly into question, especially since
French and Dutch voters rejected a planned EU constitution, partly
over concerns about the membership of this sizeable and relatively
poor Muslim country.
The European Parliament fueled angry accusations that the
admission bar is being deliberately raised for Turkey when it urged
Ankara earlier this week to acknowledge that the Ottoman Empire --
predecessor of the Turkish Republic -- committed "genocide" against
Armenians in World War I, as a condition for joining.