The opening of the negotiations for Turkey’s membership of the European Union continues to be a major argument of debate in the international press. “Does the French debate on Turkey concern Turkey? Or is it not rather a question of France?”, asks Bruno Frappat ( La Croix, 12/10), according to whom there exist “two reasons, at least, that explain the heat of the current debate. One is political, in the electoral sense. The other is political, in the more etymological sense, that concerns the future of the French ‘polis’. The electoral reason is linked to the fact that there are those who believe they can guess the state of French opinion concerning the possible membership of Turkey”. The second reason, according to the author of the editorial, “is deeper. Europe’s rapid progress, with its part of deepening (the Constitution) and its part of enlargement (today the ‘new’ members from Eastern Europe, tomorrow, perhaps, the ‘new’ member from the war-torn frontiers of the Middle East), gives a chance to a people that preserves the European heritage but has difficulty in seeing what social benefits may derive from this ancient commitment. To this is added a crisis of identity, a destabilization, especially in the religious field, that is causing anxiety”. “Europe is suffering from a deficit in democratic rule”. That’s the thesis maintained by Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, who in the pages of Le Monde (13/10) recommends the need for a “parliamentary debate” on the European Constitution . “European citizens explains the author of the article have the feeling of a democratic deficit in the functioning of the institutions of the Union (…). This frustration is fuelling their disaffection for the European system and is being expressed by abstention in European elections, which rose to 57.2% in France, in June 2004”. The American presidential elections, by contrast, are the main talking point of the Herald Tribune (13/10). With regard to the electoral recommendations being made by the American clergy, David D. Kirkpatrick and Laurie Goodstein point out: “For Archbishop Charles Chaput, the highest Catholic authority of the state of Colorado, there is only one way a Catholic can vote in the presidential elections. Without actually naming him, he makes it clear whom he means: George W. Bush against John Kerry” The Spanish daily El Mundo (14/10) carries a front-page story of the meeting between Spain and Morocco on the Sahara and the problem of immigrants: ” Morocco urges Spain to repatriate clandestine immigrants to the Sahara and not to Tangiers”. The Spanish government has rejected this plea, “ because it does not recognize the sovereignty of Western Sahara after the political conflict, as a result of which the two countries have been at loggerheads over the last 29 years”, notes the paper. The case of Buttiglione is commented on in El Periódico (14/10) in which Antonio León emphasizes “MEPs failed to reach an agreement to prevent the future of the European Commissioner“. “The European Parliament tried yesterday to calm the waters of the political crisis that erupted following the controversial statements of the Italian conservative on homosexuality and the family“, headlines the Barcelona daily. The events surrounded the nomination of the EU Commissioners are also at the centre of various comments in the German press. Martin Halusa writing in Die Welt (13/10) points out: “ The audition is nothing but the legitimate need to bring more democracy into the otherwise closed society of the EU. […] In the last analysis, the Parliament is the only representative body elected by the people in the bureaucracy of the EU. It must therefore be allowed to pronounce itself in favour or against important decisions regarding key appointments. In particular the choice of the powerful Commissioners cannot take place by diktat in Brussels and sink in the Bermuda triangle of democracy. Parliamentary controls must also hold good for those who will guide the destinies of the European executive over the next five years“. An editorial in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (14/10) comments: “ This (limited) conflict on persons is foolish. The future President of the Commission Barroso will not endear himself to MEPs by showing himself ready to cave in to pressure, especially when, as in the case of Buttiglione, a great deal of hypocrisy is at stake. Those who are so indignant about Buttiglione and his Catholicism are the same who are so enthusiastic about the entry of Islamic Turkey, in which the condition of women makes a joke of the “community of values” […] “The Commission and its members should be controlled and this occurs in a context that cannot be non-political. Therefore we ought not to be scandalized by the tactic of demolition used by the Parliament: but we ought to be shocked by the fact that some seriously believe that this type of struggle for power can conduce to the progress of the EU“. ———————————————————————————————————– Sir Europa (English) N.ro assoluto : 1332 N.ro relativo : 72 Data pubblicazione : 16/10/04
