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THE TURKISH TRAIN CRASH; CHARLEMAGNE
The Economist
December 2, 2006
U.S. Edition
A partial suspension of Turkey's EU membership talks
How to salvage something from the wreckage
MELANCHOLY is Istanbul's defining characteristic, writes Orhan Pamuk,
Turkey's Nobel prize-winning novelist. And melancholy has now descended
on the country's relationship with Europe. "Almost everyone I know
has lost heart," says Soli Ozel, a political scientist at Istanbul's
Bilgi University who wants Turkey to join the European Union.
His disenchantment is justified. Turkey's membership talks are
on the edge of collapse. The EU gave the Turks until December 6th
to open their ports and airports to traffic from Cyprus (ie, the
Greek-Cypriot republic). Turkey refuses to do this unless the Europeans
lift what amounts to their trade embargo on the (Turkish-Cypriot)
north. The current Finnish presidency of the EU has failed to find
a compromise. So the only questions now are how many "chapters" in
the negotiations will be suspended-this week the European Commission
suggested eight out of 35, all related to trade and the internal
market-and whether the suspension is handled with enough delicacy by
both sides to let them be reopened easily in a couple of years' time.
It was always going to be difficult to get Turkey into the EU. On top
of complications arising from its poverty, its mostly Muslim culture
and its mistreatment of the Kurds, it would be the largest member,
with the most votes in the Council of Ministers and the most seats
in the European Parliament. Even so, the accession talks have been
unnecessarily fraught.
During the past year Turkey and the EU have squabbled bitterly over
Cyprus, over clauses in the Turkish penal code that limit free speech
and over a French proposal to make it an offence to deny the Armenian
genocide of 1915. These may be real issues, but they have not affected
Turkey's Western orientation, as embodied in its NATO membership and
its impressive reform programme. The economy is growing by 6-7% a year;
Turkey was the first Muslim country to send peacekeepers to Lebanon.
All this suggests that the quarrel is to do as much with the Europeans
as with the Turks. In 2005 European political leaders agreed to
negotiate Turkish accession in good faith, but it is not clear that all
are doing so. Unwilling to admit that they want to keep Turkey out,
France, Austria and Cyprus are making demands that seem designed to
induce the Turks to walk away.
Now another insidious argument is being aired. Negotiations with
Turkey are not merely failing; they are damaging the country's
Westernisation. Because of the disputes, Turkish support for joining
the EU, which stood as high as two-thirds in 2004, has fallen to only
one-third now. Three-quarters of Turks believe the EU will never
let their country in. Better, say some, to suspend the talks now,
before these squabbles do more harm.
Some add that it will make little difference. The painstaking work
of bringing Turkish law into line with EU law has more or less stopped.
Talks on suspended chapters cannot restart soon because, over the
next 18 months, three elections will get in the way (presidential and
parliamentary ones in Turkey; a presidential election in Cyprus). So,
the siren voices argue, Turkey would do better to give up now and
settle for a privileged partnership instead (this is what Germany's
Angela Merkel wants). Turkey's Westernisation need not be halted,
just diverted: it began in the dying years of the Ottoman empire,
long before the EU was dreamt of, and is thus independent of it. For
the Turks, EU membership is not a matter of identity; it is a matter
of choice.
But it is a good choice-and the consequence of abandoning it could be
more serious than the Europeans realise. The EU goal helps to stabilise
several shaky elements in Turkey. For the moderate Islamist government,
it offers protection against military intervention. For the army, it
guarantees secularism. For business, it entrenches market reform. For
Kurds, it promises minority rights. Turkey would not suddenly become
like Iran if its membership bid failed. But any of these elements
might wobble-and the risk of a clash between the army and Islamists
would rise.
Nor is Turkey about to join the axis of evil. But unlike previous
applicants, it has options other than the EU: bad ones, perhaps, but
alternatives nonetheless. It could flirt with Russia or Iran (as a
former army chief has suggested). Or it could become pro-Western in
the way that, say, Egypt is.
For the EU, a rejection of Turkish membership would represent a huge
lost opportunity. Europe's foreign policy, and its hopes of global
significance, would suffer a catastrophic loss of credibility if
it were seen to be blackballing a moderate Muslim country that has
NATO's second-largest army. The EU's reputation in the Muslim world,
which is watching the membership talks with Turkey closely, would sink,
perhaps even below America's.
At home, a failure of the talks would send a message to Europe's 15m
Muslims: that you have no place in Europe. There are some 3m Turks
in Germany. What is the government going to tell them? "You do not
belong here. Please do not riot"? The Germans, who have more at stake
than anybody else, have been breathtakingly insouciant about the
consequences of a failure of Turkey's membership bid. In many ways
Ms Merkel's ambivalence has done more to damage Turkey's prospects
than the more obvious hostility of France and Cyprus.
If it is bad policy to freeze the negotiations, and impossible to
continue them, what is the alternative? At their summit later this
month, the EU's leaders will rule on the plan to suspend talks on
eight chapters and, unusually, to keep other chapters open until Turkey
allows access from Cyprus. This may send a negative signal to Turkey
but, given the doubts of many EU members, it may be the best that can
be agreed on. The Europeans, however, should put no new obstacles in
the way of reopening talks and also exert far more pressure on the
Greek-Cypriots to settle the Cyprus problem. Hitting the pause button
may be inevitable. But the pause must not turn into an indefinite stop.
The Economist
December 2, 2006
U.S. Edition
A partial suspension of Turkey's EU membership talks
How to salvage something from the wreckage
MELANCHOLY is Istanbul's defining characteristic, writes Orhan Pamuk,
Turkey's Nobel prize-winning novelist. And melancholy has now descended
on the country's relationship with Europe. "Almost everyone I know
has lost heart," says Soli Ozel, a political scientist at Istanbul's
Bilgi University who wants Turkey to join the European Union.
His disenchantment is justified. Turkey's membership talks are
on the edge of collapse. The EU gave the Turks until December 6th
to open their ports and airports to traffic from Cyprus (ie, the
Greek-Cypriot republic). Turkey refuses to do this unless the Europeans
lift what amounts to their trade embargo on the (Turkish-Cypriot)
north. The current Finnish presidency of the EU has failed to find
a compromise. So the only questions now are how many "chapters" in
the negotiations will be suspended-this week the European Commission
suggested eight out of 35, all related to trade and the internal
market-and whether the suspension is handled with enough delicacy by
both sides to let them be reopened easily in a couple of years' time.
It was always going to be difficult to get Turkey into the EU. On top
of complications arising from its poverty, its mostly Muslim culture
and its mistreatment of the Kurds, it would be the largest member,
with the most votes in the Council of Ministers and the most seats
in the European Parliament. Even so, the accession talks have been
unnecessarily fraught.
During the past year Turkey and the EU have squabbled bitterly over
Cyprus, over clauses in the Turkish penal code that limit free speech
and over a French proposal to make it an offence to deny the Armenian
genocide of 1915. These may be real issues, but they have not affected
Turkey's Western orientation, as embodied in its NATO membership and
its impressive reform programme. The economy is growing by 6-7% a year;
Turkey was the first Muslim country to send peacekeepers to Lebanon.
All this suggests that the quarrel is to do as much with the Europeans
as with the Turks. In 2005 European political leaders agreed to
negotiate Turkish accession in good faith, but it is not clear that all
are doing so. Unwilling to admit that they want to keep Turkey out,
France, Austria and Cyprus are making demands that seem designed to
induce the Turks to walk away.
Now another insidious argument is being aired. Negotiations with
Turkey are not merely failing; they are damaging the country's
Westernisation. Because of the disputes, Turkish support for joining
the EU, which stood as high as two-thirds in 2004, has fallen to only
one-third now. Three-quarters of Turks believe the EU will never
let their country in. Better, say some, to suspend the talks now,
before these squabbles do more harm.
Some add that it will make little difference. The painstaking work
of bringing Turkish law into line with EU law has more or less stopped.
Talks on suspended chapters cannot restart soon because, over the
next 18 months, three elections will get in the way (presidential and
parliamentary ones in Turkey; a presidential election in Cyprus). So,
the siren voices argue, Turkey would do better to give up now and
settle for a privileged partnership instead (this is what Germany's
Angela Merkel wants). Turkey's Westernisation need not be halted,
just diverted: it began in the dying years of the Ottoman empire,
long before the EU was dreamt of, and is thus independent of it. For
the Turks, EU membership is not a matter of identity; it is a matter
of choice.
But it is a good choice-and the consequence of abandoning it could be
more serious than the Europeans realise. The EU goal helps to stabilise
several shaky elements in Turkey. For the moderate Islamist government,
it offers protection against military intervention. For the army, it
guarantees secularism. For business, it entrenches market reform. For
Kurds, it promises minority rights. Turkey would not suddenly become
like Iran if its membership bid failed. But any of these elements
might wobble-and the risk of a clash between the army and Islamists
would rise.
Nor is Turkey about to join the axis of evil. But unlike previous
applicants, it has options other than the EU: bad ones, perhaps, but
alternatives nonetheless. It could flirt with Russia or Iran (as a
former army chief has suggested). Or it could become pro-Western in
the way that, say, Egypt is.
For the EU, a rejection of Turkish membership would represent a huge
lost opportunity. Europe's foreign policy, and its hopes of global
significance, would suffer a catastrophic loss of credibility if
it were seen to be blackballing a moderate Muslim country that has
NATO's second-largest army. The EU's reputation in the Muslim world,
which is watching the membership talks with Turkey closely, would sink,
perhaps even below America's.
At home, a failure of the talks would send a message to Europe's 15m
Muslims: that you have no place in Europe. There are some 3m Turks
in Germany. What is the government going to tell them? "You do not
belong here. Please do not riot"? The Germans, who have more at stake
than anybody else, have been breathtakingly insouciant about the
consequences of a failure of Turkey's membership bid. In many ways
Ms Merkel's ambivalence has done more to damage Turkey's prospects
than the more obvious hostility of France and Cyprus.
If it is bad policy to freeze the negotiations, and impossible to
continue them, what is the alternative? At their summit later this
month, the EU's leaders will rule on the plan to suspend talks on
eight chapters and, unusually, to keep other chapters open until Turkey
allows access from Cyprus. This may send a negative signal to Turkey
but, given the doubts of many EU members, it may be the best that can
be agreed on. The Europeans, however, should put no new obstacles in
the way of reopening talks and also exert far more pressure on the
Greek-Cypriots to settle the Cyprus problem. Hitting the pause button
may be inevitable. But the pause must not turn into an indefinite stop.