André Brie; December 6, 2006; Editorial; Disput 12/2006

 

Silence at the negotiating table

 

 

Now even the Pope has blessed it. During his visit in Turkey a couple of days ago, Benedict XVI is supposed to have pronounced himself for an entry of the country into the European Union. Even if the declarations by Joseph Ratzinger, who already during his time as Cardinal was known as vehement critic of Turk EU membership, should not have been made in all that much clarity – in any event they are a signal. That Brussels in the meantime has put some parts of the current negotiations on ice, figures on another leaf, however.

 

EU Europe has a hard time with Turkey; by the way, the Left federal parliament fraction in the Federal Parliament as well. Even the formal picking up of entry negotiations was linked to heavy pains there as well. People are in agreement by and large that the country on the Bosporus that already placed a motion for entry to what was back then the EEC in 1959, can no longer be kept hanging. And in June, the EU foreign ministers, literally in the last minute, agreed to open, according to plan, the first chapter of entry negotiations with Turkey. This fact alone was proof enough of the tense relationship between both sides.

 

It is a complex and volatile mixture of facts, fears and partly contradictory developments that marks this relationship. Thus the Papal visit in Turkey was of significance to that extent that the wind was taken out of the sails to the “occidental-Christian” enemies of an EU membership of the “Muslim Empire”. Still shortly before the visit, CSU general secretary Söder had sounded off once more that there was a “fundamental cultural distance between Turkey and Europe”. Left, liberals, Greens and social democrats had always opposed this with a principled position: The EU was in no way an exclusive or even “Christian-occidental” club. Even though the current reality often contradicts that, European integration must rest on democratic, social and ecological values, and be determined by human rights that are indivisible, by peace and by solidarity. According to the Treaties, the EU is also open for any other European country. And while the larger part of Turk territory lies in Asia, this criterion applies to it in a politically unequivocal manner.

 

More than the religious aspect, however, two other aspects move me which only at first sight seem to have nothing to do with each other: the continued massive violation of human rights in Turkey and the dispute over the recognition of Cyprus by Ankara. Both topics are supposed to get on the agenda during the entry negotiations. If one may talk of serious negotiations at all. The mandate for the talks of autumn of last year was clear. Negotiations were supposed to take place fairly, concretely, and in a result-oriented way, it said. Four weeks ago, however, the so-called progress report, however, determined the same deficiencies than before the start of the dialogue, in part even deteriorations: infringements against human and citizen’s rights in Turkey, the half-hearted realisation of democratic reforms and the continued discrimination of the Kurd minority. Why has Ankara gambled away so readily the advance of trust linked with the pick-up of talks? And why, not only I ask myself, was this permitted by the EU? Maybe one does not want a Turk membership after all.

 

Moreover, Brussels is quite clearly doing clientele politics. It is an open secret that the course of the EU face to Ankara is determined in a major way by Nikosia and Athens and that the governments, who also refuse a Turk EU membership, but do not want to say that openly, like to hide behind it. This is even though the UN plan for the overcoming of the division of Cyprus was rejected in the Greek part. Free trade promised by Brussels in a full-mouthed way to the North of the island, has as before not been granted. Why, however, should Turkey, one may think in Ankara, fulfil its part of the obligations if the other side is stonewalling? Where, and I want to state this unequivocally at this point, the keeping of human rights is no “negotiation mass” to be used at will at one moment and bracketed at another. The recognition of Cyprus as well is a natural demand. But the fact is that both sides need to move if there is to be a rapprochement and if the simmering conflict between Turkey and the EU is supposed to be relaxed. By a Papal visit alone, this won’t be accomplished.