Turkey ‘not yet ready’ for EU talks, bloc chief says

Cyprus dispute, other problems can be resolved, claim officials

Turkey’s Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul (left) shares a word with US Secretary of State Colin Powell during the launch of the North Atlantic Council foreign ministers’ meeting at NATO’s headquarters in Brussels, yesterday.

BRUSSELS (Combined reports) - The European Union’s presidency said yesterday that several issues still need to be settled with Ankara before an EU summit next week can approve the opening of membership talks with Turkey.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, however, said his country had fulfilled all conditions and that he expected EU leaders to give Ankara a definite date for starting talks without imposing any new criteria.

“Turkey has taken the steps, done the homework needed to start talks on the EU membership path,” Erdogan said in Ankara before leaving for talks with EU officials in Brussels. “There’s nothing left on the table.”

Erdogan was scheduled to meet with Jan Peter Balkenende, prime minister of the Netherlands, which holds the rotating EU presidency. He is to meet with other EU officials today to iron out any outstanding issues before the EU summit on Dec. 16-17.

“The trouble is that Turkey is not yet ready in a number of aspects,” Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot said in Brussels ahead of Erdogan’s visit.

But he added that he had “good hope that next week we will find a solution that is satisfactory both for Turkey and for the member states as well. I am optimistic.”

“We have plenty of time to solve all the problems,” EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said. “Things are still developing. We are in the finalization of the process,” added German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer.

But French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin stressed yesterday that the EU should be prepared to offer Turkey an alternative to full membership if entry talks with Ankara fail. “We do not think there should be an automatic link between entry and entry negotiations,” Rafarrin told a news conference in Paris. “There could be a successful scenario leading to membership. There could be another scenario, one of difficulties, where Turkey could not meet the (entry) criteria. In that case, one would have to devise another form of link between Turkey and the European Union,” he said.

Meanwhile, the European Union’s presidency said it was sure it could resolve a dispute over Turkey’s refusal to recognize Cyprus before the EU’s crucial summit on December 17.

“We are discussing this with both Cyprus and Turkey and as the [holder of the] presidency we are trying to find a solution to this problem,” Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot said on arrival at a NATO meeting. “I am absolutely sure the presidency... will find a formula that will satisfy everyone,” he told reporters.

Cypriot media reported that Nicosia had raised the stakes on Wednesday by threatening to veto the start of accession talks unless it won full recognition before negotiations start.

Cypriot newspapers said the country’s EU envoy warned his colleagues on Wednesday that Cyprus “may be pushed down a path it does not want to take” and may “have no other option” but to veto the start of talks if Ankara refused to recognize it.

But EU diplomats said Nicosia had blown hot and cold for months, alternatively saying it wanted Turkey to start talks and raising new demands it knew were unacceptable to Ankara.

“The Cypriots have zero support and zero credibility in the (EU) Council,” one EU diplomat said, noting there was widespread anger over the Greek-Cypriot rejection of a UN peace plan to reunite the island earlier this year, and at their subsequent blocking of EU aid for the breakaway Turkish-Cypriot statelet in northern Cyprus.

EU ambassadors were meeting for a second day to discuss a draft summit statement to which Turkey has objected because it requires tacit recognition of Cyprus, mentions torture and sets tougher conditions for Ankara than for past applicants. (AP, Reuters)