{"id":15453,"date":"2009-10-15T22:55:05","date_gmt":"2009-10-15T20:55:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishforum.com.tr\/en\/content\/?p=15453"},"modified":"2014-01-05T17:31:37","modified_gmt":"2014-01-05T15:31:37","slug":"turkey-receives-a-mixed-progress-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2009\/10\/15\/turkey-receives-a-mixed-progress-report\/","title":{"rendered":"Turkey Receives a Mixed Progress Report"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<div>\n<ul>\n<li><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/s.wsj.net\/img\/wsj_print.gif\" alt=\"The Wall Street Journal\" \/><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<ul>\n<li>EUROPE NEWS<\/li>\n<li><small>OCTOBER 15, 2009<\/small><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h1>Turkey Receives a Mixed Progress Report<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<ul>\n<li><span class=\"removed_link\" title=\"http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/article\/SB125555683453785831.html?mod=djemITP#\"><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/article\/SB125555683453785831.html?mod=djemITP#\" src=\"http:\/\/s.wsj.net\/img\/icon_smaller.gif\" alt=\"smaller\" \/><\/span> <span><span class=\"removed_link\" title=\"http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/article\/SB125555683453785831.html?mod=djemITP#\">Text<\/span><\/span> <span class=\"removed_link\" title=\"http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/article\/SB125555683453785831.html?mod=djemITP#\"><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"http:\/\/online.wsj.com\/article\/SB125555683453785831.html?mod=djemITP#\" src=\"http:\/\/s.wsj.net\/img\/icon_larger.gif\" alt=\"larger\" \/><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<h3>By MARC CHAMPION and ADAM COHEN<\/h3>\n<p>BRUSSELS &#8212; The European Union criticized a tax case against Turkey&#8217;s biggest  media group as posing a threat to press freedom, but also praised the  government&#8217;s foreign policies and its overtures to the country&#8217;s large Kurdish  minority, in a progress report on the country&#8217;s EU membership talks.<\/p>\n<p>The $4 billion in fines and penalties that Turkey&#8217;s tax authority is  demanding from Dogan Yayin Holding AS in two cases, &#8220;potentially undermine the  economic viability of the Group and therefore affect freedom of the press in  practice,&#8221; the European Commission said in a mixed annual progress report on  Turkey&#8217;s bid to join the 27-nation bloc.<\/p>\n<p>Olli Rehn, the commissioner for enlargement, told reporters his team had  analyzed the Dogan tax case. &#8220;I have asked the Turkish authorities to treat this  matter very seriously,&#8221; he said. He added that with fines larger than the  company&#8217;s annual turnover, the case &#8220;feels like a political sanction&#8221; as well as  a fiscal one. Dogan controls about 50% of media outlets in Turkey and has been  critical of the government.<\/p>\n<p>Turkey&#8217;s government strongly denies that the Dogan case is politically  motivated. Officials note the country has a large underground economy and say  they are merely pursuing unpaid tax from Dogan and thousands of others.<\/p>\n<p>Turkey&#8217;s chief EU negotiator Egemen Bagis welcomed the report, describing it  as the most objective to date, in remarks to Turkish media.<\/p>\n<p>The progress report on Turkey was one of three on EU candidate countries,  along with Croatia and Macedonia, as well five on ex-Yugoslav nations, including  Albania, Serbia and Bosnia Herzegovina, which the EU has agreed should  eventually be allowed to join the bloc.<\/p>\n<p>Talks with Croatia are nearing their final phase, the commission said, after  the ex-Yugoslav republic resolved a border dispute with neighboring Slovenia.  All member states countries have to approve a new member, and Slovenia joined in  2004.<\/p>\n<p>Turkey faces a much tougher road. Eight so-called negotiating chapters have  been blocked in a dispute with Cyprus over Turkey&#8217;s treatment of the divided  island.<\/p>\n<p>The commission praised Turkey&#8217;s recent signature of a deal with Armenia to  reopen the border between the two countries and establish diplomatic relations.  Turkey&#8217;s effort to improve relations with the Kurdish authorities in Iraq and  with its own Kurdish minority also gained praise from the commission. So, too,  did a law passed in June to demine Turkey&#8217;s border with Syria, and Turkey&#8217;s  efforts to mediate in the Middle East.<\/p>\n<p>But EU officials say Turkey&#8217;s EU bid isn&#8217;t helped by such high-profile cases  as Dogan. Turkish authorities levied fines and penalties of 915 million Turkish  lira ($633 million) on the Dogan group&#8217;s media unit in February, and a further  4.8 billion lira last month. The government on Tuesday put a lien on some of the  company&#8217;s assets after rejecting collateral it offered to put up while fighting  the tax charges.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Write to <\/strong>Marc Champion at marc.champion@wsj.com and Adam Cohen at adam.cohen@dowjones.com<\/p>\n<p><cite>Printed in The Wall  Street Journal, page A2<\/cite><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<div>\n<p>Copyright 2009 Dow Jones &amp; Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>EUROPE NEWS OCTOBER 15, 2009 Turkey Receives a Mixed Progress Report Text By MARC CHAMPION and ADAM COHEN BRUSSELS &#8212; The European Union criticized a tax case against Turkey&#8217;s biggest media group as posing a threat to press freedom, but also praised the government&#8217;s foreign policies and its overtures to the country&#8217;s large Kurdish minority, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":783677,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[846,835,89],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-europe","category-turkey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/783677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}