China, Turkey and Churches” “

While the European Parliament re-convenes, after the summer, to tackle some burning issues of more particular relevance to the present time (terrorism, air safety, competition of Chinese textile products, 2006 budget), the main questions raised by the presentation of the programme of work of the British Presidency in July remain on hold: start of negotiations for Turkey’s EU accession; financial resources 2007-2013; re-launch of the process of the ratification of the European Constitution; and social Europe. THE WORK OF THE EP. MEPs met in Strasbourg from 5 to 8 September. The European Parliament evaluated the positions of Council and Commission on the recent natural disasters that have struck various European states, on the possible responses to the terrorist threat, and on the EU budget. Also important is the Declaration issued by the Commission on “Dialogue with the churches and non-confessional organizations” (on which SIR will include a report in its next number). With regard to the growth in imports of textile products in the old continent, the Saïfi report asks that “third countries, and in particular China, respect the international rules and apply minimum standards in the social and environmental field”. According to the report presented to the assembly, “the fight against counterfeiting” needs to be reinforced and “a textile plan drawn up that would fix a specific budget for research, innovation, training and the support of medium and small businesses”. The question was also addressed in Beijing on Monday 5 September, during the eighth EU-China summit, in the presence of the head of the Executive, José Manuel Durao Barroso. TurKEY UNDER THE SPOTLIGHT. MEPs then held a debate on air safety, after the several plane crashes of recent months. The definition of the budget for next year, the integrated programme for employment, the promotion of cultural works “made in Europe”, and the Sarnez report on safer surfing of the Internet for children were all discussed. Meanwhile discussion continues in the corridors of Strasbourg on the forthcoming opening of negotiations with Ankara, after the institutions of the Union agreed, last December, that the negotiations should open, as planned, on 3 October 2005. In actual fact, no final decision on the matter emerged from the informal meeting of Foreign Ministers of the 25, held at Newport (Wales) last week. The question will be re-examined anew by COREPER (meeting of the permanent representatives of the member states in Brussels) and the final decision ought to be taken by the European Council on 3 October. At Newport, the UK Foreign Minister, Jack Straw, declared he was “reasonably confident” that the deadline for the opening of negotiations would be respected. The Turkish government has itself complicated things by declaring it does not consider the extension of the commercial accords signed with the EU to the ten new member states as an automatic recognition of the Cypriot Republic. DOUBTS GROW. The nub of the problem consists precisely in the relation between Turkey and Cyprus (the northern part of the island is occupied by Turkish troops and Ankara does not recognize the full sovereignty of Nicosia). On the other hand, not only accession, but even the start of negotiations seems impossible, without a candidate State (in this case Turkey) accepting the existence of a country (Cyprus) as a full and legitimate member of the EU. Doubts on this point are growing; they have already been widely expressed by Austria, Greece, France and the CDU-CSU candidate for the German Chancellorship, Angela Merkel, who has called instead for a relationship of “privileged cooperation” to be established with Turkey. According to Hans Gert Poettering, leader of the European People’s Party, the largest political grouping in the EP, “the EU would end up being overwhelmed” by the possible entry of the Eurasian country as a full member. Schuessel: “Precedence to CroaTIA”. European politicians also seem sensitive to the opposition emerging from European public opinion on Turkey’s EU membership bid, already confirmed by the French and Dutch rejection of the European Constitution (a rejection interpreted a coded message calling for a stop to the Europe “without frontiers”) and by recent opinion polls (in Germany 62% of citizens are in favour of blocking Ankara’s road to the EU). So the question remains open: Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul has declared in recent days that if the 25 pose “new conditions for Turkey’s accession to the EU, or offer us something less than the status of member, we won’t go the negotiating table”. An even tougher stance has been taken by Turkish premier Recep Tayyip Erdogan, according to whom “some countries, for reasons we don’t understand, want to see the EU as a club for Christians. But it isn’t; for us the Union is a sum of the values we share”. Moreover “Turkey has already fulfilled all the so-called Copenhagen criteria for the start of negotiations”. In the view of the Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel: “the membership of Croatia ought to take precedence over that of Turkey”.