Turkey and the European Union
The ever lengthening road
Dec 7th 2006 ISTANBULFrom The Economist print edition
The obstacles in the way of Turkey's membership of the European Union get ever more daunting
“FIRST they tied our arms, now they are going to tie our legs.” The words of a top Turkish official sum up the gloom in Ankara as European Union leaders prepare for next week's summit in Brussels, where they will once again argue over Turkey. Whatever the outcome, Turkey's prospects of being the EU's first mainly Muslim member have never seemed so bleak.
Turkey's long-delayed membership talks opened almost 15 months ago amid much fanfare. “Hello Europe” read one newspaper headline. But the talks soon ran into trouble over Turkey's rejection of the EU's demand that it fulfil its legal obligation to open its ports and airports to traffic from Cyprus (ie, the internationally recognised Greek-Cypriot republic). The Turks rebuffed a deadline of December 6th, insisting that they will not give way until the Europeans fulfil their own promise to end the trade embargo on Turkish northern Cyprus.
The European Commission has proposed the suspension of eight of the 35 chapters in the membership talks. This week the French president, Jacques Chirac, and the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, endorsed this plan, and also called for a full review of Turkey's progress in early 2009. “We don't want to set any kind of ultimatums,” said Ms Merkel, who wants Turkey to accept a “privileged partnership”, not full membership. “But we want the commission to say to us what has been achieved and how we could proceed.”
Late into the week, negotiations continued under the Finnish EU presidency. A Turkish offer to open one port and one airport to Cyprus seems unlikely to work as it is clearly dependent on a reciprocal offer by the Greek-Cypriots. If no compromise is found, little progress will be made. Relations will worsen if Nicolas Sarkozy becomes France's president next spring: unlike Mr Chirac, he is fiercely against Turkish membership.
Turkey's hopes are now pinned on the Americans. President Bush is expected to embark on a round of telephone diplomacy this week. He may secure a reduction in the number of frozen chapters. But regardless of their number, suspended chapters can be reopened only with the unanimous approval of all EU members. This “leaves the door open for them to impose further intolerable conditions on us,” comments the top Turkish official.
Most Turks believe that Turkey's detractors simply do not want a large, Muslim country in their midst. Their aim is to wear down Turkey's resistance and induce it to walk away. Yet the mildly Islamist prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, says he will not fall into that trap. “Forcing Turkey to abandon the [negotiating] table would be a dreadful mistake; Europe, not Turkey would stand to lose,” he said this week. He added that Turkey would pursue its membership goal with determination and, moreover, that it had a plan B and C.
Nobody seems to know what such plans might entail, but government sources hint that consultations with the EU over, say, Afghanistan and Iraq, or on drugs and human trafficking, may be slowed down. Instead Turkey will try to repair relations with America that remain fraught over Iraq, especially over the increasingly autonomous Kurds in northern Iraq. It will also build up its role in the Middle East, the Caucasus and the oil-rich former Soviet central Asian countries.
Most Turks believe that Turkey's detractors simply do not want a large, Muslim country in their midst
Cocking a snook at the Europeans could help Mr Erdogan's AK party to win votes in parliamentary elections due next November. Public support for the EU has already dropped to well below 50%, down from highs of 80% or more two years ago. Mr Erdogan will also take heart from the economy, which has grown by an annual average of 7% since 2001, four times as fast as the EU's. The markets seem unfazed by the rows over EU membership; the Turkish lira rose against the dollar this week.
But economic progress hinges on whether Mr Erdogan sticks with his IMF-imposed reforms. It may also depend on whether he decides to become president when the incumbent, Ahmet Necdet Sezer, retires in May. Turkey's militantly secular generals recoil at the thought of both the presidency and the government being run by Islamists. How far they might go to stop this remains a vexing question. The EU membership talks have provided the most effective rein on the generals so far.
Just as ominously, Mr Erdogan's claim that he will continue with political reforms, regardless of what happens over the EU, is beginning to look shaky. Article 301 of the penal code, under which Orhan Pamuk, Turkey's best-known novelist, was prosecuted last year, remains on the books. Human-rights abuses against the country's 14m Kurds have been curbed but by no means stopped altogether.
Meanwhile, Mr Erdogan's tired assertion that rejecting Turkey would provoke a “clash of civilisations” by sending a message to the Muslim world that the EU is a Christian club, is exaggerated. “Turkey has no real connection to the Arab world, so whether Turkey gets into Europe or not doesn't really matter to the ordinary guy in Amman or Riyadh,” says Yusuf Al Sharif, a Palestinian commentator. “There isn't even an Arab cultural centre in Turkey.” Mr Erdogan's overtures to Iran and Syria (he visited both countries this week) have less to do with Muslim solidarity than with a common desire shared by all three to prevent the emergence of an independent Kurdish state in Iraq.
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In short, both sides in this dispute need to regain some perspective. Turkey is right to feel cheated over Cyprus (the Greek-Cypriots won EU membership even though they voted in April 2004 against the UN's Annan plan to reunite the island, whereas the Turkish-Cypriots remain isolated even though they voted in favour). But it must also show that it is sincere about pursuing EU-inspired reforms. If the EU is to regain its moral authority with the millions of Turks who long to have a full-blown modern democracy, it needs to prove that membership of its club is not only the best way to achieve that goal—but also one that is still genuinely on offer.
