Adultery fault line with EU

"We learned with concern about the delay that took place in the Turkish national assembly for the adoption of this code, and we understand this delay is due to attempts … to reintroduce adultery as a criminal offense," European Commission spokesman Jean-Christophe Filori told a briefing in Brussels.

"Such provisions would certainly cast doubts on the direction of Turkey’s reform efforts and would risk complicating Turkey’s European prospects," he said.

Prime Minister Erdogan sounded defiant in the face of the EU warning. "The European Union is not indispensable for us," he said, attacking European Commission spokesman Flori for interfering in Turkey’s domestic affairs.

Erdogan told party members that Turkey had done all it needed to do to meet the political criteria for starting EU entry talks, adding, "Let nobody try to pressure Turkey by using the EU [as an excuse]."

New Penal Code centerpiece of reforms
Filori said the new penal code was vital if Ankara was to meet the criteria agreed upon in Copenhagen in 1992 and added that making adultery a criminal offense would send the wrong signal over Turkey’s European credentials.

"The new penal code in Turkey is of utmost importance in Turkey’s political reform process," he said.

"It addresses several issues directly linked to the political criteria of Copenhagen and therefore plays an important role in our final assessment for the 6th of October."

Diplomats and analysts expect the commission to give a positive assessment to Ankara’s entry bid, but starting talks with the mainly Muslim, if officially secular, nation of 70 million is controversial in many EU member states.

The EU’s executive commission is due to present a report on Oct. 6 on whether Ankara has met a series of political and economic criteria that the bloc insists on before it will start accession talks with Turkey. EU leaders are expected to decide on whether to open the bloc’s door to Turkey based on the commission report during a summit meeting in December.

Speaking after his spokesman, EU Commissioner for Enlargement Guenther Verheugen said delaying adoption of the new Turkish Penal Code was worrying but that there was no reason to delay the Oct. 6 report.

"I can only say it would be much better to have the new penal code adopted because this is the centerpiece of the question of whether Turkey meets the conditions of being a state of law," he said.

Verheugen, on his last fact-finding trip to Turkey earlier this month, ahead of the report’s release, said it would be a "historical joke" if Turkey had to make a choice between EU membership and making adultery a crime.

Erdogan risks derailing EU quest
Erdogan is reported to have been insistent on reintroducing adultery as a crime under pressure from his grassroots, but he risks jeopardizing Turkey’s EU bid.

Columnist Murat Yetkin of liberal daily Radikal said Erdogan was trying not to upset the AKP’s mostly pious and conservative voters. but the proposal to jail cheating spouses had outraged women’s rights groups and Turkish liberals and alarmed the EU.

Earlier in the week his Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP) had appeared to shelve the adultery amendment plans, only to try to revive them after Erdogan’s return from an overseas trip.

The AKP during Thursday’s parliamentary debates emerged with a fresh proposal named "sexual infidelity" and sought the support of the main opposition Republican People’s Party, which refused to back it. Finally, the government decided the put the entire amendment package on ice.

Leaders of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) discussed the problem behind closed doors on Friday, but it seemed inevitable that Parliament would not now approve the reform package before the commission’s report on Turkey due to be released on Oct. 6.