Ankara barking up the wrong tree

Term-presidencies have significant clout. If it holds such an opinion, other member countries will find it very hard to change it. But still, that’s exactly what Turkey is trying to do.

Ankara is barking up the wrong tree.

It is either not apparent that getting a date is more important than anything else or some bureaucrats are endangering the Dec. 17 summit on mistaken assumptions.

These are the issues that the government wants to change in the commission report.

-Open ended negotiations

Ankara is very uncomfortable with the sentence in the report that says "the negotiations are open-ended." Some are ignoring the fact that such a sentence was included in the report to appease those who were opposed to Turkey’s membership. The founding agreement of the EU and its constitution are very clear on the issue. Article 49 of the agreement and Article 1.57 of the new constitution says: "The only objective of the negotiations is full membership." In other words, it is certain that Turkey will become a full member at the end of the negotiations. Strangely, some in Ankara are misinterpreting this fact.

-Negotiation method

The changes made in the negotiation process for Turkey is due to Turkey’s special status, its hugeness and distance from EU norms in some respects, together with the problems encountered in the previous negotiations. The purpose is to push Turkey and the EU closer together in some respects before the start of negotiations and to ensure the implementation of reforms. This method will be beneficial to Turkey by boosting foreign investment and at the end of negotiations no member country will have the grounds to oppose our membership.

-Suspension

The suspension of negotiations under exceptional circumstances is nothing new. The negotiations with Slovakia, Bulgaria and Romania were suspended.

– Free movement

Until now, Turkey aired its view on this issue many times and announced that it was willing to adhere to a long period of adjustment. This matter was included in the report just to dispel fears about our membership. Moreover, this matter is open to negotiation. All research studies say that by 2030, the Europe will be begging us to send workers, so this matter is mute.

– Not 2014, but 2012

Another misperception is that some believe the negotiations will last until 2014, because the EU budget says so. However, in order for Turkey to be included in the 2014 budget, the negotiations need to end in 2012.

Our misperceptions will come to haunt us
As I mentioned before, the biggest error in calling for changes to the commission report is that it may open Pandora’s Box and the inclusion of many other preconditions that we never knew about.

There is only one thing Turkey needs to hear from the Dec. 17 summit and that is the start of the negotiations sometime in 2005.

As Ankara wastes time calling for useless changes, it faces the possibility of missing out on the bigger picture.

Either some people are confusing Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul or advisors who know what they are talking about are ignored in favor of those who are trying to force the issue to a standoff.

We are at the end of a very critical process.

Let’s not make any mistakes here. No one can stop a Turkey that has started the negotiations and those issues we seem to be sensitive about will soon become meaningless details.