FT: ‘EU warns Turkey over law on adultery’

"The European Commission has told Turkey that the adultery proposals could hurt Ankara’s plans for membership talks with the EU," the newspaper said in a report by its correspondents Daniel Dombey in Brussels and Vincent Boland in Ankara.

The proposals, which would make adultery a crime punishable by imprisonment, would be debated by the country’s Parliament today, it said. The FT described Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan as "socially conservative," explaining that his argument was that criminalizing adultery would serve to protect women.

The commission is scheduled on Oct. 6 to issue a progress report on Turkey as to whether to start membership talks with Ankara and EU leaders who are expected make their decision in a December summit.

The commission’s recommendation will be based on Turkey’s progress on human rights and democratic reforms, but many officials are worried that the adultery proposals are intolerant and invasive, according to the FT.

The paper said although the legislation applies equally to men and women, critics argue it would be used mostly against women. "If Turkey has not renounced or abandoned it, the commission will probably deny Ankara the clear endorsement it seeks, people close to the issue say," reported the FT.

"That could result in a delay in the start of the negotiations, or even a move by EU leaders to defer the decision over whether to begin talks," it added.

Adultery was a crime in the Turkish penal code until it was deleted for men in 1996 and for women in 1998. Some observers in Ankara said the attempt to reinstate it as a crime was being led by religious conservatives in Erdogan’s broad-based Justice and Development Party (AKP), the FT said.

"The adultery proposal is clearly a tactical mistake by the Turks," the FT quoted an EU official as saying. "If they pushed this through a couple of weeks before the commission’s recommendation, it would simply make things more complicated for them," the official added.