A date for Turkey’s EU membership negotiation

This way Turkey was able to largely comply with the common trade policies. None of the countries which became EU members last weekend could have gone so far forward in their relations with the EU. Actually the EU countries accepted Turkey’s membership at that time. For this reason, the acceptance of Ankara’s candidacy at the 1999 Helsinki summit was a declaration. So a date for membership negotiations would be nothing new.

After the referendums on Cyprus, Turkey thought that both itself and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) should be rewarded by it getting a date for membership. The Turkish nation is also fixed on this expectation. If the EU doesn’t give us a date at the end of the year, the Turkish nation will react very harshly. At this point, the EU has two alternatives. One is to accept us as a member in good faith, and the other is to keep Ankara in suspense for a long period of time, all the while pushing for great concessions required for membership. However, both of these alternatives require the EU to give Ankara a date. I guess the EU countries can see this obligation.

Turkey should make clear to the EU countries which concessions we could never accept, to prevent the impression that we’ve left our future in the EU’s hands by waiting at its threshold. One firm principle is that we can neither give up nor violate the pillars of our indivisible state. Secondly, we will neither accept the accusations of Armenian ‘genocide,’ nor apologize to them, nor give them land or compensation. Thirdly, they shouldn’t request from us anything that would violate our principle of secularism.”