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The European Union says it will forge ahead with a plan to open
membership talks with Turkey in October despite widespread misgivings in Europe about letting
the predominantly Muslim nation into the bloc. The EU says the
negotiations will be open-ended and that Turkish
membership is not inevitable.
The 25-member European Commission, the EU executive body, held what one
of its members described as a lengthy, lively, argumentative debate on
whether to begin the October talks on schedule and how to conduct the
negotiations.
In the end, says EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli
Rehn, his colleagues decided that the EU has to stick to its commitments
to start the talks, as agreed by EU leaders last December, despite fears
that the bloc is expanding too far and too fast.
"It is a matter of credibility for the European Union and also for
Turkey, and, in my view, it is now important to get started and give
Turkey a fair chance to prove whether it will be able to meet fully all
the conditions of membership during this long and possibly winding road," said Olli Rehn.
Negotiations on Turkey's accession to the EU are expected to take a
decade. And, says Mr. Rehn, an outcome resulting in Turkish membership is
not guaranteed.
"The clear objective, the shared objective of negotiations is
accession," he said. "The negotiations are open-ended. We cannot guarantee
any automatic result, and, in any case, Turkey will have to be anchored to the European structures
through the strongest possible bond."
Hostility to bringing a populous, poor, mostly Muslim
country like Turkey into the EU was a factor in the recent rejection by
French and Dutch voters of the EU's draft constitution. Some political
leaders, like French interior minister and presidential hopeful Nicolas
Sarkozy, have called for further EU expansion to be put on hold
indefinitely. Others, like German opposition leader Angela Merkel, have
suggested that Turkey be granted a so-called "privileged partnership"
rather than full membership in the club.
Mr. Rehn says such talk came up on Wednesday in the debate within the
commission.
"There is no denying that the privileged partnership was raised in the
debate and I think it is a fact of life that the privileged partnership
will be a part of the political debate in the months and years to come,"
continued EU Enlargement Commissioner .
Although Mr. Rehn says he expects a Europe-wide public debate on what
kind of relationship the EU should have with Turkey, he believes the long
negotiating process itself will encourage the implementation of further
reforms, more democracy and greater respect for human rights and the rule
of law in Turkey. | 
