Turkey warns on 'dilution' of EU goal

By Tony Barber in Brussels

Turkey warned France on Wednesday against trying to bury its aspirations to European Union membership by manipulating a "wise men's committee" that is expected to pronounce on Europe's long-term future.
Mehmet Simsek, Turkey's economy minister, also re­affirmed his government's promise to remove an obs­tacle to Turkish entry by changing a much-criticised article of the penal code that makes it a crime to insult Turkish national identity.
Mr Simsek's remarks amounted to a forceful assertion of Turkey's rights as an official candidate for EU membership and of its readiness to take politically difficult measures to achieve its goal.
"Purely technically, in terms of adopting the acquis [the EU's body of accumulated law], I think Turkey can do this by 2014 very comfortably," Mr Simsek said. "But we don't really have an entry date in mind, and what is importantis that we keep the process alive. We hope that common sense will prevail."
Mr Sarkozy's proposal for a "wise men's committee" of 10 to 12 people to study the EU's future up to 2020 or 2030 is expected to win approval from fellow EU leaders at a summit in Brussels next month.
Some EU states, such as Austria and France, oppose Turkey's entry, even though accession talks started in October 2005. Angela Merkel, chancellor of Germany, the EU's biggest country, says she would prefer a "privileged relationship" with Turkey to full membership.
EU countries sympathetic to Turkey, such as Sweden and the UK, want the committee's members to be carefully chosen and its mandate to be precise, so that it does not turn into a vehicle for critics of Turkey.
Mr Simsek made clear in no uncertain terms that Turkey would accept no recommendation from the "wise men" involving a privileged EU relationship, partnership in a French-proposed Mediterranean Union, or anything else short of full EU membership.
"We cannot accept dilution of the commitment to Turkey. Dilution sends an extremely poor message," Mr Simsek told a meeting of the European Policy Centre think-tank.
Referring to the association agreement that Turkey signed in 1963 with the European Economic Community, the EU's forerunner, Mr Simsek said: "We waited in the anteroom for 40 years. Trying to find a way to dilute the commitment doesn't serve French interests."
Mr Simsek said the ruling Justice and Development party was strong enough after its comfortable election victory in July to amend Article 301 of the penal code, a step that the European Commission said this week should be a precondition of Turkish entry into the EU.
"My government would like to amend it, and we will. But I'd like to highlight that it's easy to change legislation but it takes a long time to digest the changes and to change the mentality," he said.
"More importantly, we'd like to make fundamental changes that would secure these freedoms in a more fundamental way. Things don't happen overnight," he added.
Discussing a recent spate of attacks on Turkish targets by the separatist Kurdish PKK movement, Mr Simsek said Turkey preferred not to launch a military incursion into northern Iraq, but stressed that it remained an option.
"If there is a military incursion, it will be aimed purely at rooting out terrorists on Iraqi soil. It will be limited in scope," he said.
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