SIGNIFICANT BREAKTHROUGH FOR EU ACCESSION

 

Turkey’s victory in the Eurovision 2003 music competition at Riga was a very encouraging development for accession to the European Union. Close scrutiny of the votes cast by the European nations for this competition proves that it was an arranged victory for Turkey presumably to make it forget about the “Old Europe’s” past mistakes and a subtle green light to accession for Muslim Turkey. It is also the favourable European response to the Turkish parliament and government for their rejection of becoming a tool in an illegitimate aggression against Iraq. It is doubly important at a time when American sources are making soundings through the media and other means about Ankara’s prospective stance over a similar American military operation on Iran. To avoid the repetition of the American “disappointment” on this vital issue similar to the 1 March rebuff, please read the article below to see why the Turkish answer will definitely be “no way”,  no matter what the underhanded and indirect soundings of the United States may show to them. 

 

The Turkish song and belly dance at the Eurovision contest was quite good but there were deeper reasons for Turkey’s last minute victory. Above all, it was quite unfair to the charming English girl who did not get a single vote at the competition. As the European media made a point of it, the result was an expression of Europe’s unanimous disapproval of PM Blair’s Iraq policy rather than the English team’s failure in music. Likewise Turkey’s victory was the outcome of the TGNA’s (The Turkish Grand National Assembly’s) remarkable performance on 1 March in rejecting to be a base and tool in the hands of a hardliner American Administration unworthy of that country’s miraculous democratic system, rather than Sertab Erener’s musical genius.  

Significant and successful arrangement at Eurovision voting

No conspiracy theory or speculation at all, it was apparent that Turkey would have never won the competition if it had not been for “Old Europe’s” subtle help. The eight votes to Turkey from the Greek Cypriots, as well as more from Greece and especially 12 votes from Belgium, which meant voting itself out of a certain victory, along with other favourable votes of the anti coalition bloc (of the Iraq war), made Turkey win with much deeper political consequences especially about Turkey’s place in the world – the EU accession. Russia was an exception in this regard. Not only has a single vote not come to Turkey from Russia, but also from its allies such as the small Baltic States of the Soviet time, plus Croatia. It was either because Russia has not yet understood the intrigues of the free market world and remained on the wrong side of the battle in this subtle coalition/anti-coalition competition in Europe or more likely still is the fact that the French-German-Russian cooperation of the Iraq war does not go as far as a deeper alliance between the “Old Europe” and Russia. As for the Coalition countries of Europe, the UK was the most generous towards Turkey with seven votes; Spain, Poland and the others were simply tight fisted in their marks for the winner of the contest, Turkey.

It is obvious that the France-Germany leadership of the EU wanted to provide Turkey with a golden opportunity in becoming the 28^th full member of the Union, along with Bulgaria and Romania, with negotiations for accession as from the end of 2004. The next year’s Eurovision competition in Turkey will be a most timely opportunity to show the world that Turkey is European with its culture, civilisation and the current economic level. The progress reports to the EU summits towards the end of this and next year will get a boost from the European people’s appreciation of Turkey at the 2004 Eurovision performance, all being well. Ankara has been mobilized to make it a success. The summer vacation of the Turkish Parliament will be cut down to one month for it to pass the legislative parcel needed for this year’s progress report and feverish activity is going on in Turkey to make this sixth legislative parcel a success for accession.

For a change Europe seems to be sincere in responding to these efforts, as evidenced by the outcome of the Eurovision contest and the statements of the EU Commission. Meanwhile, the EU is also doing its best to iron out the disputes and grievances between Turkey and Greece, the Cyprus problem heading this list and so far so good.

Noteworthy about the European integration is the fact that the split in the EU is becoming more apparent each day with the UK leading the pro-American “coalition front” and France and Germany trying to tighten the ranks of the “anti-coalition front”. The teaming up of these two factions during the debates for preparing a draft constitution for the European Union at the EU Convention headed by President Valery Giscard d’Estaing is a good indicator of the future trends for European integration. PM Blair categorically says of the future of the European integration in regard to this draft constitution, “United nations of Europe. Not a federal super state.”

Turkey’s place in this grouping is also crystallizing with the Erdogan Government’s role in guiding the Islamic world and the Middle East countries in favour of the German-French alliance at the expense of the Anglo-Americans. The OIC (Organisation of Islamic Countries) Foreign Ministers conference in Tehran last Wednesday (28^th) was a proof. While the pro-American members Kuwait, Qatar and Bahrain, plus Saudi Arabia boycotted the Tehran conference, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul did not only attend it straight after the Europe-Mediterranean Foreign Ministers conference in Crete on Monday (26^th), but also made extensive lobbying among the Islamic countries and delivered a very important statement calling for a radical reform in Islam to raise women’s place in society and to conform to western standards in all fields. It was simply strong support to Iran at a time when Washington’s arrows are being turned against Tehran.

And that was not all. On Friday (30^th) PM Tayyip Erdogan was on the Iranian frontier inaugurating the Gurbulak frontier gate equipped with the most modern devices to cater for 220,000 vehicles a year (about 600 a day) shuttling between the two big neighbouring countries of this region to give a boost to regional trade. Starting with the Habur gate with Iraq, Turkey will continue with the establishment of these modern frontier gates with its neighbours in an attempt to have a kind of a common market in this region, starting with the so called “frontier trade”.

In other words, Turkey is becoming a centre for trade with the Middle East and Gulf regions and it will also stretch in time to the Caucasus and Central Asia. To what extent these activities are in conformity with Washington’s latest initiative about closing down all foreign embassies in Baghdad and its efforts to raise the Kurdish existence in northern Iraq into a de facto Kurdish State, remains to be seen. 

Turkey is determined to do its home work for accession

Before the end of June, that is by the Selonica summit on 20-21 June, Ankara will hand to the EU Commission the sixth harmonisation parcel as an important stride towards accession. It will make changes in 16 Turkish laws on the path of eliminating ten more points demanded by the EU for accession.

General Tuncer Kilinc, Secretary General of the NSC, has handed the Prime Minister a note objecting to three of these changes as prejudicial to national security and the media presented it as the objection of the military to Turkey’s EU membership. General Ozturk, Chief TGS, as well as his assistant, General Buyukanit have categorically rejected the claim that the Turkish Armed Forces were against EU membership. General Ozturk said he had not seen General Kilinc’s letter to the Government, indicating that these three points were not the objections of the armed forces to the EU. General Buyukanit was even more emphatic and said on Thursday (29^th) at an international seminar in the War College in Istanbul on “Globalisation and its impact on international security” that the Turkish Armed Forces were never against EU membership, as certain quarters have recently begun to systematically claim in the media. “The European Union for Turkey is a geopolitical and geo-strategic compulsion, in the direction shown by Ataturk,” stressed General Buyukanit.

Whether it is the Turkish Armed Forces’ official policy or not, it is a fact that the military and most people are quite sensitive about the three points raised by General Kilinc concerning the West’s demands of Turkey. These three points are:

·        Abolishing Article 8 of the Anti-Terrorism Act stipulating penalties for activities against the “integrity of the State with its territory and nation” would encourage separatist activities in the country.

·        Receiving observers from the EU at the elections is tantamount to accepting the Ottoman capitulations.

·        Broadcasting on private TV stations in the mother tongue (Kurdish) would encourage separatism and should be avoided. Only the TRT should make such broadcasts under the supervision of the security organisations and that is the case in most EU countries.

The Government’s answers to these points are ready. They say there are sufficient provisions in the Penal Code to safeguard the “integrity of the State with its territory and nation” and Article 8 of the Anti-Terrorism Act can be dispensed with. Having foreign observers in the elections has nothing to do with the Ottoman capitulations. Turkey has already accepted this provision within the OSCE (Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe) and the provision has been in force also at the 3 November elections and before. Private TV channels in Kurdish are already at work from abroad and are comfortably followed in Turkey. They have so far proved to be ineffective. Such broadcasts cannot be prevented with today’s technology anyway. Besides, the previous Ecevit Government also made several changes in this regard and none of the fears and anxieties proved justified in practice.

The special place of the military in Turkey and EU accession

PM Tayyip Erdogan was well prepared for the 28 May NSC meeting concerning these three sensitive points of the military, but contrary to press speculations, the matter did not come up in detail with the NSC. The President and the security organisations preferred the Cabinet to complete the Sixth Harmonisation parcel and discuss it as a whole in June at a special session, if necessary.

The special status of the military in the Turkish Constitution will apparently be one of the main difficulties in accession to the EU, but Germany and France also have similar sensitivities for their national security and integrity. It is believed that with the current “spring atmosphere” with the EU since March 1^st it will not be too difficult for Turkey to win over the non-coalition majority of the EU in explaining the historic reasons for it.

Paradoxically, the special status of the armed forces in Turkey derives from the wish to keep them outside daily politics through a military rule in the country, rather than their wish to go in for day to day politics, as the Americans and Europeans seem to think.

Yet this status which includes such practices as the Chief, TGS coming straight after the Prime Minister, before the Defence Minister, in State Protocol; a separate judiciary for the military, not subject to the civilian Court of Appeal’s supervision; and autonomy in military assignments, promotions and retirements is not totally conforming to the European system. There may be some difficulties in the harmonisation parcels with the EU on these points, but Turkey’s special location and conditions are being better understood now.

Until the end of next year, the one-party rule with a comfortable majority in parliament in Turkey may cover a long distance in opening up the path for official negotiations for accession. The biggest hindrance to this successful performance in the pipeline may be Washington’s ever growing disenchantment of Turkey, but there is enough experience in Turkey to overcome that barrier. uras@ada.net.tr – June 1^st, 2003