Germany Supports Turkey's EU Membership Bid

German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, on his first official visit to Ankara, has promised strong support for Turkey's push to join the EU. A decision on Turkey's candidacy is expected before the end of the year.

Chancellor Schröder has given Turkey's EU enthusiasts reason to hope. A statement of support from the largest nation in the EU bloc is crucial if Turkey is to get the go-ahead to begin negotiations for EU membership.

"I believe Turkey is on the right path with its reform process," Schröder said at a joint news conference with Turkey's Prime Minister, Tayyip Erdogan. He said that Erdogan's political and human rights reforms should help Turkey get a positive assessment from the European Commission when it publishes an annual progress report in October.

EU officials will decide in December if they'll give Turkey the green light to become a candidate for EU entry.

http://www.dw-world.de/english/0,3367,1433_A_1121703_1_A,00.html

They will be a United Europe with over 450,000,000 people. The largest major consumer base in the world. The US is being replaced as the Big Dog on the block.

It's a deal and is happening officially in a few weeks. One remaining question is Cyprus, will it join whole or partly occupied.

But it will still take years when the labor market and CAP is fully integrated and the newcomers are seen fit to join euro, and the constitution is still open question. Lot to do... learning while doing it...

in short time to be sure. Of course this benifits Schoroder politically with the large Turkish population in Germany.

I was at a conference in Brussels (at the Justus Lipsius Complex) in 96 where a German Commissioner was talking about EU enlargement, specifically with Turkey and Cyprus. After his 45 minute or so presentation, he proceded to have his head ripped off in the question and answer session by every Greek in the auditorium. At one point, the simultaneous translator refused to translate a statement because it was filled with lots profanity.

This is a very touchy issue as is Cyprus.

Greece - the Greek governement and especially Papandreou - is one of the staunchest supporters of Turkish membership in EU, has been for many years, provided that the Cyprus question is solved, biggest problems are French (both left and right) and German right wing parties.

Few yers ago Kohl who wished to hide behind the back of Greece, to use it as proxy to stop Turkish process and to play mr Nice Guy himself, but Greeks, including right wing politicians, told Kohl to go stuff some pig stomach, they support Turkey's membership.

in the Eurovision Song Contest, you knew that things were getting better ...

For the simple fact is, they are not European. And their human rights record is, well, atrocious. They aren't just Turkey, they are the Turk. And they have a lot of history with europe-most of it bad.

The Germans are playing a role. Doing a little salving of wounded pride, and so on. But I don't think europe will ever forget Constantinople...and Byzantium.

Orthodox Russia, the inheritor of the Eastern Roman Empire, would not look kindly on Turkey's admission and the europeans need Russia pretty bad just now. I can't imagine what they would need Turkey for.

You know, it's mostly Europeans slaughtering each other and then slaughtering other people on other contintents. And then some, couple big ones last century...

The Great Idea of European union is not to forget her history, but to learn from history and try to free herself from repeating the same mistakes. Greece, Spain and Portugal had very bad human rights record before they joined EEC, having been military dictatorships only few years before joining.

History of Turkey is not dissimilar with many military coups, but the membership process has allready done a ton of good for human rights, minority rights, sexual equality, curbing the power of military etc. Still lot to do for Turkey. Now there are great hopes for Cyprus. After Cyprus, the biggest question for Turkey is to put army totally under civilian control, which is difficult but possible, and the Turkish governement of AKP is certainly willing to do that.

The biggest reason why France oppeses Turkey is the same reason she was not happy about the enlargment, is that Turkey is big, the same size as Germany, and thus will diminish French influence inside the Union, which France wants to be somekind of new Napoleonic empire of governable size. EU will not, it is and will be 'something else'.

Europe needs Russia's oil and gas, not much else, and more than that she needs to be not too dependent on Russia or anybody else. Seven new members have bad memories from Soviet Empire and don't think too kindly of Russia. EU - Russia relationships are now at low point, Russia want's to make a big bundle of all the open questions - Kyoto, WTO, visa, Kaliningrad etc. - and EU don't like that a bit.

Turkey will almost certainly get a date for opening negotiations this year, but it will be a long way, membership will depend on Turkey's progress and will happen only sometime next decade. Integration with EU has already started with customs union etc., it is gradual process where full membership is just one pole, and the process has been and will be beneficial for both Turkey and the rest of Europe.

is not part of europe geographically. And as far as I know, the Turks themselves are originally from central asia. I believe the europeans, when they say "European Union"...mean just that.

Further attention to a map shows Russia being a natural resource base for europe, of almost every kind, not just oil and gas-and a large market as well. On this last, I had hoped my own country, the US, would have made Russia it's major strategic ally...and we may still do this-in which case the EU might forget the past and turn to Turkey for balance. But I would not count on it.

And while you make a good point about the negative feelings of former eastern european satellites for Russia... with their sometimes large orthodox populations, this doesn't necessarily translate into positive feelings for Turkey. The longer negotiations take, the more impact this last will have.

And Turkey will have continuing trouble on the human rights front. Even with civilian control of the military, what of the Kurdish question? It isn't going to go away, you know. The Kurds are the largest minority on this planet without their own homeland...and Turkey seems intransigent. To me, this alone is a show stopper.

But again, if US/EU relations continue to deteriorate (and they will, due to dollar/euro conflict), and if the US is forced out of the middle east by domestic opinion, I think the US will turn to Russia. If this happens, Turkey is probably "in" the EU.

At any rate, there are large movements afoot in the world today, and you are obviously well-studied on what we have been discussing. I could be completely wrong about everything I have written here, and it wouldn't surprise me one bit. I appreciate your point of view, and share your hopes for Turkey and it's people. Their impact on history has been large, and I am sure it will be just as large in the future.

Thanks for your reply.

Are Malta (closer to Africa) and Cyprus (closer to Asia) somehow more Europe geographically that Anatolian part of Turkey? Is Caucasus, including Armenia and Azerbaidzhan, part of Europe or Asia? Is Greenland part of America or Europe? Geographical definition of Europe is vague, and EU should not be geographically defined. It is a matter of controversy, naturally, my own view is that EU should be similar to Hellenism, community defined by shared values and culture(s), not by geography or ethnicity.

To say that the Caucasus and Urals are the boundries of Europe, which I guess is the traditional definition on the EurAsian landmass, is not very precise. Entire nations may be included in the boundry alone. And as to the islands, you are correct, culture should be the determining factor. Greenland, as you indicate, is a little fuzzy-as it lies closer to North America, yet is a possesion of Denmark.

And of course, a hellenistic system is the ideal structure for relations among nations, in my opinion as well. And I suppose Turkey would have to be considered the most western-oriented of Islamic nations...It shares a Mediterranean culture with many EU nations.

I guess it boils down to, are the Europeans going to be inclusive, or exclusive. Will they embrace an Islamic nation with Asiatic roots, albeit as culturally western as say, Spain? I honestly don't know. But I can tell this is of concern to you.

It may all come down to geopolitics. England and France have always sided with Turkey against Russia. The dollar/euro struggle is the great game afoot, and all else will be subordinate to this. I believe there is a great chance of continuing deterioration in US/EU relations, especially if Bush is re-elected. If we turn our backs on the Europeans, we will be facing our new ally, the Russian...at which point Turkey, which is militarily very strong, will become extremely important to the Europeans. Other considerations would be put aside.

Or, the US may patch up existing differences with the EU (if Kerry wins), and use American influence to help Turkey gain entry into the EU. We were tring to do that, or at least I thought we were, when our current difficulties broke out with the Europeans.

As for the French...they will always be the French. The US would have probably lost our revolution had it not been for them, and they have aided Turkey in the past as well. They almost always seem to do the right thing in the end. They gave us the Statue of Liberty and victory against England...perhaps when put to the test, they will have something good for Turkey as well. They are the most idealistic of us all...which is the origin of their arrogance, I think!

This plus the Turkomen's horrible record on human rights plus
the Cyprus mess makes me think the time is not right for
the EU Turkey addition. Maybe in ten years.

...is that Turkey will have to make a choice. Either mess with the Kurds in newly-established-but-not-yet-announced Kurdistan (formerly Northern Iraq), or have a chance at joining the EU and live with Kurdistan -- one or the other. In addition, it appears that Cyprus seems to be taking care if itself lately. We'll see.

So really, it seems like it's sort of up to Turkey: Either move forward, or move backward.

I think you are right, there is little chance of Turkey actually invading independent or autonomous Kurdistan, because that would put a full stop on European hopes. They will keep on making angry noises.

If Turkey gets date for beginning negotiations at the end of this year, membership will happen somewhere aroung 2015. Thats eleven years :).

Cyprus will be solved in a couple months and the biggest fear now is that Greek Cypriots will reject the Annan plan in the coming referendum.

Personally I think we owe it to Kurds to accept Turkey in EU, European human rights and minority standards are and have been and will the best thing for the Kurds in Turkey, and Kurdish political parties put their political hopes in EU membership, forcing Turkey to continue its transformation.

in the EU is that some Europeans rather see the Turks cleaning there streets then see Turkey becoming prosperous.
Some Europeans are stuck with there heads in the past and are unable to look at the future, with or without the EU Turkey is changing and getting wealthier by the day. The current government in Turkey works hard to make the lives of all the Turks better, it consists of Turks, Kurds, Laz and Circassians. They are not corrupt as the former administrations. Kudos to the present administration. :-)

kucinich.us

sharpton2004.org

Are you implying there is xenophobia and bigotry in Europe?!!! :D :D :D

May I ask what's your relationship with Turkey, or rather how close?
I've lived few years in Greece :).

I'm not big fan of AKP, not more than any Christian democratic religious right wing whacko party, but from the beginning I saw the election result as positive thing, naturally with a lot of historical irony. Turkey cannot become democratic according the European standard as long as the Kemalian military establishment pulls the strings, and the only force strong enough to challenge the establishment is islamists playint the pro-european, pro-democracy card... and the Kemalian ultra-secular establisment on the other hand keeps the islamist tendencies at bay... so like weed through street plates, democracy is raising in Turkey, not because good guys are winning by themselves but because both 'bad guys' sort of negate each other and can only use the democracy & EU card against each other... the irony! Hopefully this turns into something more lasting and Turkish society grows more mature and beyond Kemalist nationalist ideology...

Kemalian military establishment will not end abrubtly it will take some time. AkP's first year in power was in many ways positive, Turkey did change a lot during this time compared to former administrations hopefully this continues. The first thing that Turkey at this moment needs is economic stability the democratic reforms will follow, Turkey suffered a high inflation for the last for decades every 3 years there was an economic crisis this all led to anarchy many times. Unfortunatally there is not a real social-democratic party in Turkey like in most European countries. I was first sceptical against AKP but they turned out very differently.
There is xenophobia in Europe, right wing parties rise like mushrooms all over Europe. In Holland where I live the very succesfull labour party lost very bad against the right wing, people are looking at foreigners different then a few years ago.

kucinich.us

sharpton2004.org

AKP first year has surpassed even my somewhat positive expectations. Greatest event was the "accident" when Turkish democracy turned down opening northern front against Iraq, and parliament did not betray the popular will. I think even though accidental, that moment was a watershead in Turkish history, pro-US Kemalists losing big time and people experiencing that things can change.

And I agree the shift from the Kemalian system will be necessarily gradual one, the real change may take a generation or two, it is also a question of education. But EU has made it pretty clear if Turkey wants in, army must be under civilian control and no secret army budget that parliament can't control. Do you think this may happen, or what are AKP's chances of making this true without military responding with a coup?

We can only hope the current xenophobic right wing wave in Western Europe is a transitory one.

for most of my live!

kucinich.us

sharpton2004.org
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