Ankara rejects European ‘blackmail’ on Cyprus

Turkey’s FM digs in heels despite EU deadline for Turkish compliance

Photo: Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul (left) and Turkish-Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat (right) attend an army parade in the Turkish-occupied area of Nicosia last week. Gul yesterday reiterated that Turkey would not bow to pressure from the EU to open its sea and air ports to Cyprus.

ANKARA (AFP) – Turkey said yesterday that it will not respond to EU pressure over Cyprus, one day after the bloc warned that Ankara’s failure to fulfill its commitments to the EU member country could harm its membership bid.

“Issues such as Cyprus cannot be solved with deadlines or blackmail,” Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul told reporters in parliament, the Anatolia news agency reported.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan also ruled out any concessions.

“If they (the EU) put unacceptable conditions before us, it will not be possible to make progress,” Anatolia quoted him as saying.

Under a customs union agreement with the European Union, Turkey must open its ports and airports to Cyprus.

It refuses to do so, however, until the 25-nation bloc keeps its promise to ease the international isolation of the Turkish-occupied north of the island.

“If there is no agreement and Turkey does not honor its commitments, the EU will need to consider the implications for the accession process,” Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen of Finland, which holds the rotating EU presidency, warned on Monday.

Vanhanen said he wanted the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, to quickly make a recommendation on Turkey so the bloc’s foreign ministers can weigh their response accordingly when they meet on December 11.

Finland has been trying to resolve the stalemate since September with a proposal that includes Turkey opening its ports and the EU trading directly with the Turkish-occupied north of Cyprus.

Gul said Ankara had not rejected the Finnish proposal and that it was still under negotiation.

“It is still under discussion. The Finnish presidency is making efforts (for a solution) and we support those efforts,” Gul said, adding that he would fly to Finland on Sunday for talks.

“We still have time,” he added.

The trade row threatens to derail Turkey’s accession talks a little more than a year after they started in October 2005.

The EU promised to ease economic sanctions against the Turkish-occupied north of Cyprus in April 2004, after Turkish Cypriots voted for a UN plan to resolve Cyprus’s 32-year division.

The plan was rejected by the Greek Cypriots, whose government in the south is internationally recognized, who joined the EU in May that year without the Turkish Cypriots.

STRASBOURG (AFP) – The European Court of Human Rights yesterday condemned Turkey for failing to legally recognize a civil servants’ trade union. A Turkish court had originally condemned the district authorities for failing to respect a 1993 collective agreement with the Tum Bel Sen union, when ruling on a complaint from two Turks aged 55 and 48. That ruling was overturned by an appeals court in 1995 which said the union had not been legally founded and so had no authority to conclude a collective agreement. In its ruling yesterday, the court said that the annulment of the collective agreement had amounted to an interference in the complainants’ freedom of association. It awarded the two 20,000 euros in moral damages.