A tiny thaw?<\/p>\n
Many Turks have given up, but progress towards the EU inches forward<\/p>\n
Feb 23rd 2013 | ISTANBUL |From the print edition<\/p>\n
AFTER 30 months in the deep freeze Turkey\u2019s bid to join the European Union is for once warming a bit. France, which under Nicolas Sarkozy\u2019s presidency blocked five of the 35 chapters that must be completed, has lifted its veto on one to do with regional aid. In Cyprus Nicos Anastasiades has a big lead in the presidential election (see article). He backed a 2004 UN plan to reunify the island that was accepted by Turkish-Cypriots but rejected by Greek-Cypriots. He could give Cyprus\u2019s settlement talks a new push that might lead to its dropping some of its own vetoes on new chapters. Queasiness over letting in a big, powerful and prickly Muslim country aside, the EU\u2019s biggest gripe with Turkey is its refusal to open ports to Greek-Cypriot vessels.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo force can tear us away from Europe,\u201d said Turkey\u2019s foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, at a recent conference. Yet Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the prime minister, has talked of joining the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation with Russia, China, and Central Asia (he later recanted). Such frustration is understandable: popular Turkish support for EU membership has fallen from over 70% when talks began in 2005 to as low as 33%. Nothing grates more than the various forms of watered-down membership touted by Germany\u2019s Angela Merkel and other naysayers like the Austrians and the Dutch. \u201cMembership is like pregnancy: you either are or you aren\u2019t. There is no halfway position,\u201d scoffs Egemen Bagis, Turkey\u2019s Europe minister.<\/p>\n
Under Mr Erdogan\u2019s Justice and Development (AK) party, Turkey\u2019s economy has become the world\u2019s 17th-biggest. \u201cEuropean excuses about Turkey being a poor country are rubbish,\u201d says Cengiz Aktar, an academic and EU specialist. Ten years of AK rule has also made Turkey more democratic. With scores of generals in jail on coup-plotting charges, the army has lost power. Yet Mr Erdogan\u2019s critics say that, after a decade in government with weak opposition, AK has become arrogant and overbearing. Turkey, says the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, is the \u201cthe world\u2019s leading jailer\u201d of reporters, with at least 49 hacks behind bars. Dissidents are jailed under vague anti-terror laws. Mr Bagis\u2019s response\u2014\u201cI\u2019m not saying Turkey is perfect. But it is better than yesterday\u2019s Turkey\u201d\u2014will not satisfy many.<\/p>\n
Turkey is also flexing its muscles abroad. Foreign aid has risen 27-fold in the past decade. But a car bomb that killed many Turks on the border with Syria this week was a brutal reminder of the risks in Turkey\u2019s support for rebels against Bashar Assad, Syria\u2019s president. The West\u2019s failure to intervene has left Turkey isolated. Indeed, a thaw with Europe could not have come at a better time. Mr Erdogan has resumed peace talks with the jailed Kurdish leader, Abdullah Ocalan. The lure of EU membership could propel both Turks and Kurds into a deal. Some provisions would have to go into the new constitution that the parliament is trying, amid much squabbling, to draft. The Kurds insist that more regional autonomy be one of them. The unfrozen EU chapter on regional aid, says Mr Aktar, \u201cmeshes perfectly with this\u201d.<\/p>\n
From the print edition: Europe<\/p>\n
via Turkey and the European Union: A tiny thaw? | The Economist.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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