Turkish Forum

Tag: EU presidency

  • Turkey Hopeful during Ireland’s EU Presidency

    Turkey Hopeful during Ireland’s EU Presidency

    EU Minister Bagis said Turkey was hopeful its bid to join the European Union would accelerate during Ireland’s presidency of the EU.

    DUBLIN — Turkey’s EU Minister and Chief Negotiator Egemen Bagis said Turkey was hopeful its bid to join the European Union would accelerate during Ireland’s presidency of the EU in the first half of next year.

    Speaking to Irish Times during his Ireland visit last week, Bagis said “Turkey did not expect to become a full member of the EU during the Irish presidency but they were pragmatic and they would work very hard to achieve the goal of putting Turkish-EU relations on a much more reliable track”. He added they thought with strong Irish support they could turn the process around.

    Mary Fitzgerald, the Irish Times foreign policy correspondent wrote in her piece Bagis’s statements on Turkey was heartened by signals from Paris that French president Francois Hollande, while stopping short of endorsing Ankara’s candidacy, took a more sympathetic view than his predecessor Nicolas Sarkozy, who was strongly opposed to Turkey’s accession.

    Turkey began formal accession talks in 2005 but has completed only one of the 35 policy ‘chapters’ every candidate must conclude in order to join the EU. All but 13 were blocked by France, Cyprus and the European Commission said Bagis and added he hoped France would unblock talks over its accession on at least two policy chapters in the coming months ahead of a visit by Hollande to Turkey.

    Given Ireland’s position of supporting Turkish accession, Bagis said he believed its six-month EU presidency would mark a ‘historical turning point’ in the process.

    He said despite dwindling domestic support, Turkey has continued to push for full membership of the EU, saying it wanted to join before 2023, the centenary of its founding as a republic.

    Bagis repeated Ankara’s line that the EU needs Turkey more than Turkey needs the EU. He compared the EU’s economic crisis with Turkey’s soaring growth rate, and said Turkey was crucial for European access to regional energy sources and lucrative markets.

    Bagis acknowledged that in several EU states where governments support Turkish accession, including Ireland, public sentiment did not always match the official position. He bemoaned the ‘prejudice’ he said was at the heart of this opposition.

    He said he had detected a shift in the personal views of Minister for European Affairs Lucinda Creighton, who had voiced strong opposition to Turkey joining the EU before she became Minister, in an official visit to Turkey earlier this year.

    Bagis said Turkey had an image problem, and added that “But when people visited Turkey, they would see that it was different to what they expected”.

    Responding the criticism of the EU for shortcomings in free speech and freedom of religion, and has raised concerns over minority rights, Bagis said progress was being made in these areas. He said the reform process was going faster, and Turkey was becoming more democratic and dynamic.

    Tuesday, 25 December 2012

    Anadolu Agency

  • Turkey’s EU Bid Is ‘Stalled,’ Cyprus to Blame, Van Rompuy Says

    Turkey’s EU Bid Is ‘Stalled,’ Cyprus to Blame, Van Rompuy Says

    Turkey’s bid to join the European Union is “stalled” and Cyprus is to blame, EU President Herman Van Rompuy said.

    Cyprus, its northern part occupied by the Turkish army, has used its veto power as an EU member to freeze Turkey’s entry talks since mid-2010. The Cypriot government now holds the EU’s six-month rotating presidency, making progress before 2013 unlikely.

    “Were it not for some challenges from one of the members of the European Union, Cyprus, we would have made more progress when it comes to Turkey,” Van Rompuy told a Brussels conference today. “I acknowledge that negotiations on enlargement are stalled for the time being because one of the members of the club has problems with the process.”

    Since opening the entry negotiations in 2005, Turkey has completed talks in only one of 35 EU policy areas. Its failure to advance contrasts with Croatia, which started the process at the same time and is scheduled to join the bloc in July 2013.

    “Intensive discussions are ongoing and I hope to visit Turkey to get that message across,” Van Rompuy said.

    via Turkey’s EU Bid Is ‘Stalled,’ Cyprus to Blame, Van Rompuy Says – Businessweek.

  • Turkey refuses to attend EU events if Cyprus presides

    Turkey refuses to attend EU events if Cyprus presides

    Turkey will not attend any event Cyprus presides over when the divided nation assumes the European Union presidency in July, Turkey’s foreign minister said today, although it will continue to collaborate with the EU.

    Turkey does not recognize Cyprus as a sovereign nation and opposed it taking over the EU presidency until a solution to the dispute is found. The island was split into an internationally recognized Greek-speaking south and a breakaway Turkish-speaking north in 1974 when Turkey invaded after a coup by supporters of a union with Greece. Only the Greek section is part of the EU.

    “EU-Turkey relations and the political contacts we are currently establishing will continue as they are,” Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu told a joint news conference with EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton and Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule. “Yet no ministry or organization of the Turkish Republic will take part in any activity that will be presided by Southern Cyprus.”

    Eight policy issues have been frozen by the bloc over Turkey’s refusal to allow ships and planes from Cyprus enter its ports and airspace.

    Turkey, however, is showing renewed interest in reviving its stalled bid to join the European Union, now that one of its key opponents Nicolas Sarkozy is no longer the president of France.

    Turkey began its EU accession negotiations in 2005 but made little progress in its candidacy, thanks to its dispute with Cyprus and opposition from Sarkozy to Turkey’s membership. Sarkozy argued that the predominantly Muslim country is not a part of Europe and wanted Turkey to accept some kind of a special partnership with the EU instead of full membership an offer Turkey rejected.

    Now that Socialist Francois Hollande has replaced the conservative Sarkozy as France’s president, Turkey hopes France will be more sympathetic to the candidacy of a country that has one of the world’s fastest growing economies and is becoming a regional diplomatic player.

    “Turkey will determinedly progress in its course toward the EU,” Egemen Bagis, the Turkish minister in charge of EU affairs, said Thursday.

    Ashton, meanwhile, thanked Turkey for sheltering nearly 27,000 Syrian refugees who fled violence in neighboring Syria where forces loyal to President Bashar Assad are waging a crackdown on an uprising.

    “First of all our thought everyday with the people of Syria,” Ashton said. “We are horrified by the violence and determined to work together in support of solutions.”

    -AP

  • Cyprus – a litmus test for Turkey

    Cyprus – a litmus test for Turkey

    Famagusta Gazette 9 April 2012

    By Robert Ellis

    RobertEllisSweden’s Minister for International Cooperation Development, Gunilla Carlsson, has confirmed in a joint article together with Turkey’s Minister for EU Affairs, Egemen Bagis, Sweden’s full support for Turkey’s bid for EU membership.

    This comes as no surprise, as four years ago Sweden’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Carl Bildt, declared that “the AKP government is made up of profound European reformers”.

    What was also predictable was Ms. Carlsson’s statement at the round table meeting with Mr. Bagis that it was unacceptable to stall Turkey’s accession negotiations because of bilateral issues that had nothing to do with the EU itself. This was evidently a reference to the unresolved Cyprus dispute.

    When Sweden was term president of the EU in the second half of 2009, the draft of the General Affairs Council conclusions in November noted that “bilateral issues” should not hold up the accession process but needed to be resolved by the parties concerned “bearing in mind the overall EU interests”.

    In effect, this relegated the Cyprus issue to the level of the border dispute between Croatia and Slovenia, but because of opposition from other EU member states the paragraph was dropped from the Council’s conclusions.

    This attempt to sweep the issue under the carpet is reminiscent of British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s reference to the Sudetenland conflict in 1938 as “a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing”.

    What is notable is that Ms. Carlsson spoke of a struggle to embrace deeply owned common values, as this is precisely the issue that is at stake in Cyprus. In effect, Cyprus can be considered a litmus test as to whether it is possible for two ethnic communities to coexist inside the same national framework, and, on a larger scale, whether Turkey can fit into the European Union.

    Prime Minister Erdogan has accused the European Union of being “a Christian club” but President Gül on his first official visit to Cyprus in September 2007 stated “There are two realities on Cyprus, two democracies, two states, two languages, two religions”, which are the same arguments advanced by opponents of Turkey’s EU membership.

    Turkey’s invasion and occupation of northern Cyprus in 1974 cemented the division of the two communities but also opened a shameful chapter of Turkish history.

    The European Commission of Human Rights in its 1976 report documented the conduct of the invasion forces and the Committee on Missing Persons is working to establish the fate of 502 Turkish Cypriots and 1,493 Greek Cypriots missing after the intercommunal fighting in 1963-4 and the Turkish invasion.

    The US Helsinki Commission in its 2009 report on the destruction of cultural property in northern Cyprus documented that 500 Orthodox churches or chapels have been pillaged, demolished or vandalized and 15,000 paintings have disappeared.

    Furthermore, the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) has in its 2012 report recommended that Turkey be designated a “country of particular concern” notwithstanding its importance as a strategic partner.

    The USCIRF delegation found three main issues in northern Cyprus, including the inability of Orthodox Christians to hold services at their places of worship and the disrepair of churches and cemeteries as well as the preservation of religious heritage.

    Egemen Bagis is surely disingenuous when he at the meeting with the Swedish minister criticized the EU for blocking most of Turkey’s accession talks. As he remarked, “They want us to do our homework without actually telling us what our homework is.”

    Even to Mr Bagis, the solution must be apparent. In 2006 the EU Council froze negotiations on eight chapters because Turkey refused to honour its commitment according to the Additional Protocol and extend the customs union to the Republic of Cyprus. Consequently, a solution to the conflict would remove the main stumbling block to Turkey’s accession process and serve to heal the wounds of the past.

    By virtue of its strategic position, and now because of the gas deposits in its Exclusive Economic Zone, Cyprus is a key player in the eastern Mediterranean, and therefore it was short-sighted of Turkey not to invite Cyprus to the Syria meeting in Istanbul on 1 April.

    Once again, the European Parliament has called on Turkey to begin withdrawing its forces from Cyprus, to transfer Famagusta to the UN and for the port of Famagusta to be opened under EU supervision, but this call will no doubt fall on deaf ears. Turkey’s threat to boycott Cyprus’ EU Presidency is also counter-productive.

    As the European Parliament concluded in its resolution on Turkey’s 2011 Progress Report, the interdependence between the European Union and Turkey can only produce positive results if it is framed in a context of mutual commitment.

    (Robert Ellis is a regular commentator on Turkish affairs in the Danish and international press.)

    via Cyprus – a litmus test for Turkey | EuropeNews.

  • Nicosia hails conclusions of Council about Turkey

    Nicosia hails conclusions of Council about Turkey

    Nicosia hails conclusions of Council about Turkey

    Article | December 11, 2011 – 2:00pm

    Cyprus’ government is satisfied with the content of the conclusions of the General Affairs Council that concern Turkey, said Government Spokesman Stefanos Stefanou, while commenting on the text of the Conclusions of the General Affairs Council of the European Union, at the Presidential Palace on 7 December.

    In the conclusions, Turkey is urged to avoid any kind of threat or action directed against a member state and is called upon to commit itself to good neighbourly relations. It is evident that the EU indicates to Turkey to terminate the threats it launches against Cyprus in connection with the explorations that our country is conducting for hydrocarbons in the Cyprus EEZ. In the conclusions there is an extensive reference to Turkey’s Cyprus-related obligations as these are outlined in the Conclusions of December 2006 and in the Declaration of September 2005, which unfortunately Turkey has not fulfilled, so far, thus causing the EU’s deep dissatisfaction.

    The Council underlines the need for full and non-discriminatory implementation of the Additional Protocol towards all member states. In the conclusions, an important reference is made on the fact that the non-discriminatory implementation would provide a significant boost to Turkey’s negotiation process.

    In the absence of progress, the Council has decided to maintain its measures from 2006 which, as it is known, led to the freezing of eight accession chapters for Turkey. According to the conclusions, the Council expects Turkey to actively support the ongoing negotiations aimed at a fair, comprehensive and viable settlement of the Cyprus problem within the UN framework, in accordance with the relevant resolutions, and in line with the principles on which the Union is founded.

    via Nicosia hails conclusions of Council about Turkey | New Europe.

  • Turkey to freeze relations with EU from January – Cyprus – ANSAMed.it

    Turkey to freeze relations with EU from January – Cyprus – ANSAMed.it

    (ANSAmed) – ANKARA, DECEMBER 8 – The announced ”freeze” on Turkey’s relations with the EU will start already at the beginning of the coming year, and not only in the second half of it, due to the fact that Cyprus will soon be taking on the EU’s rotating presidency. This was underscored in a Turkish daily after the position was announced yesterday by a high-level deputy in Ankara. The newspaper, Turkiya, also underscored that the boycott of the EU Council would last 18 months, since it was linked to the presence of Cyprus in the ”troikas”, meetings chaired by the State currently holding the EU presidency but flanked by the countries holding the presidency in the previous and successive 6-month periods.

    Cyprus – which represents only the Greek-Cypriot half, with the country divided in two since the 1974 invasion by the Turkish due to Greek Colonels regime’s aim to annex the island after they had taken power through a coup – will be taking on the EU presidency in the second half of 2012 and will therefore be present in the ”troikas” from January 2012 until June 2013.

    Turkey does not want to sit at the same table as Greek-Cypriot representatives, reports the newspaper in referring to the fact that Ankara does not recognize the Republic of Cyprus (which represents only Greek Cypriots) as a state.

    ”We will be freezing our relations with the Council” presided over by Cyprus, co-chairman of the Turkey-EU joint parliamentary committee Afif Demirkiran told journalists yesterday. The statement confirmed previous early announcements made by Ankara last summer when, even at the level of the prime minister, it had threatened to freeze relations with the EU if the rotating presidency were to be entrusted to Cyprus in July without a previous conclusion of the talks on the status of the divided island underway with UN mediation. Cyprus’s veto is one of the obstacles to Turkey’s bid for EU membership. (ANSAmed).

    via Turkey to freeze relations with EU from January – Cyprus – ANSAMed.it.