WORLD VIEWS: TURKEY’S BID TO ENTER EU HAS WORLD-SHAPING SIGNIFICANCE
Edward M. Gomez, special to SF Gate
San Francisco Gate
Oct 4 2005
As the 25-member strong European Union gets ready to begin direct
negotiations with Turkey over its bid to join the political and
economic Euro-club, debate over the predominantly Muslim country
has become more heated than ever. At issue, opponents of Turkey’s EU
bid argue, are “the consequence[s] of welcoming in[to the EU group]
a poor, culturally alien nation whose population of 70 million could
one day make it the largest [European] Union state” — drastically
changing Europe’s historic character. On the other hand, as the mayor
of one Turkish Mediterranean resort put it, both the EU and Turkey
“stand to benefit from each other in equal measure. We are a young,
secular Muslim country that offers to help broaden Europe.”
(Telegraph)
Governments of all but one of the current EU member states had
officially shared that optimistic outlook and had backed Turkey’s
bid to eventually be allowed to join the group. Until late yesterday,
the only holdout was Austria.
Vienna had insisted that, instead of being weighed for full-fledged
membership, Turkey should be considered only for a lesser, “privileged
partnership” in the EU. (Der Kurier/Independent) Austria’s adamant
position threatened to prevent long-anticipated direct talks between
the EU and Turkey on its membership bid from moving forward.
Finally, by yesterday evening, the Austrian government had pulled back
and appeared to be on the same page as its 24 EU partners, making
it possible for negotiations with Turkey to proceed. But just hours
before the diplomatic breakthrough, with the EU-Turkey talks on the
verge of collapse, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw warned that
the EU was “standing on the edge of a precipice.” (Britain holds the
EU’s rotating presidency.) (Guardian)
Like Straw, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has
championed his country’s EU-membership bid, feels strongly that
Turkey’s inclusion in the European organization “would help to build a
bridge between Christian and Muslim countries.” During the final days
of the Austrian impasse that had threatened to hold up yesterday’s
scheduled start of direct EU-Turkey negotiations, Erdogan told his
ruling Justice and Development Party that the debate over Turkey
was “a test for the E.U.” He said: “The E.U. will either decide
to become a global actor or it must accept that it is a Christian
club.” Erdogan “said Turkey’s future did not depend on membership,
but he claimed that the future of relations between Christianity and
Islam did.” (Financial Times)
Erdogan also emphasized that no matter how Austria’s original
demand that Turkey only be allowed a diminished EU membership status
ultimately played out, his country would not “deviate … from its
course” of further democratization and reform. The Turkish leader
added that his people would, “however, be saddened that a project
for the alliance of civilisations [would] be harmed.” (Independent)
Europe and Turkey Weigh In
Officially — now that Austria’s position appears to have changed —
the governments of all 25 EU member countries support Turkey’s bid
to join the continental club, but dissent is still palpable — and
even widespread — across Europe and among some Turks, too.
Prominent opponents of Turkey’s accession to the European Union include
former French President Valery Giscard d’Estaing, who spearheaded the
effort to write the draft EU constitution that referendum voters in
France and the Netherlands rejected earlier this year.
In Austria, where the government, until yesterday’s change of position,
had insisted that it was “speaking for those across the E.U. who
[did] not support [Turkey’s] accession,” a new Austria Press Agency
poll published last Sunday indicated that 54 percent of EU citizens
now “oppose Turkey joining the bloc,” with “[t]he figure ris[ing]
to 73 percent in Austria, where a historical antagonism towards
Turkish Ottoman imperialism combines with modern-day fears of Muslim
immigration from the poor east.” (Guardian)
If admitted, “Turkey would become the E.U.’s first Muslim member”
and “the [group]’s second-largest country after Germany. It would
also be the bloc’s poorest country, with gross domestic product per
person at a quarter of the E.U. average.” (ADN Kronos International)
On the plus side, Turkey’s supporters in Europe have argued that “the
lure of E.U. membership has already brought great improvements —
notably, the abolition of the death penalty — in its human-rights
record.” However, opponents of Turkey’s EU-membership bid “say it
has not sufficiently improved its human-rights record. It has not yet
recognized Greek Cyprus, an E.U. member, and it disputes the general
view that its campaign against the Armenians in 1915 was a genocide.”
(The Age)
It is significant, too — bearing in mind centuries-old cultural
differences between what are now Turkey and Europe, and the fact
that only a small portion of Turkey’s territory lies geographically
in what is normally thought of as the European continent — for those
who oppose Ankara’s EU bid that “this is not merely an argument about
Turkey. It is an argument about the identity of Europe.” Many Europeans
who oppose Turkey’s EU bid feel that they will be sacrificing their
collective identity if the modern state that emerged from the ashes
of the Ottoman Empire is allowed to join the group. Their “anxiety
was best summed up in Denmark, where a Muslim headscarf was recently
placed on the ‘Little Mermaid’ statue in Copenhagen with the words:
‘Turkey in the EU?'” written on an accompanying sign. (The Age)
Turkey’s bid to join the EU isn’t without controversy at home, either:
This past weekend in Ankara, thousands of supporters of the Nationalist
Movement Party took to the streets to protest the plan.
(EFE/Terra España)
“[U]ltra-nationalists from all around the country” came to hear party
leader Devlet Bahceli assail Erdogan’s government for making Turkey
have to face “an environment of enmity from outside and an environment
of treason from within. …” Bahceli pointed out, critically, “that
Turkey was being insulted at every E.U. gathering.”
(Turkish Daily News; registration required)
In reaction to Austria digging in its heels and not yielding on
its anti-Turkey position, and other criticism from Europe, Turkish
President Ahmet Necdet Sezer and Speaker of the Parliament Bulent
Arinc had noted that their country had been on the receiving end of
discrimination by some Europeans.
Nevertheless, Sezer asserted that, eventually, Turkey’s “E.U.
[membership-accession] process would be completed” without his
countrymen having to give up any of their “national interest” or
“self-esteem.” He said: “It is to no one’s benefit to build walls of
prejudice around Europe. Every obstacle that will be put in front of
us will be the stones of a wall that will block Europe.”
“Arinc indicat[ed that] the E.U. sets irrational and illogical
conditions [and] said: ‘This is not a country [that] is helpless and
obliged to Europe.'” He said Turkey would not “sacrifice everything,”
including its self-esteem, to join the EU. (Zaman Online)
Meanwhile, Britain’s Times noted (as did EFE/Terra Españ), “Support
for joining the E.U. is falling in Turkey, from three-quarters [of
the overall population] a year ago to two-thirds now.”
Many Turks have been deeply offended by what they’ve perceived as
“foot-dragging by some European countries” with regard to their
country’s EU bid. At the same time, “there is a growing body of
nationalist and traditionalist opinion, angered by the abrupt changes
in Turkish society, that would rather pull out of accession talks
altogether [rather] than [have to] submit to the … straitjacket”
of rules and regulations issued by the EU’s central bureaucracy,
which is based in Brussels. (The Times)
Will Turkey Face Its Past — and Its Present?
Serious consideration of Turkey’s desire to join the European Union
means that some of the most controversial aspects of its modern
history and politics, whose impacts are still being felt today,
will be coming up for open and, for some Turks, unsettling discussion.
Among them: Turkey’s treatment of its ethnic Armenian population and
its ongoing occupation of the northern part of the island of Cyprus.
“Territorial disputes with neighboring countries, rule by the military,
a record of repression of minorities and human-rights violations,
economic underdevelopment and low indicators of human development
render Turkey unable to match up to E.U. member countries and
unsuitable for membership.” So notes Hratch Varjabedian, an Armenian
journalist based in Lebanon, in the op-ed pages of the Daily Star
(Beirut) — and those are some of his milder criticisms.
Pointing to issues which, inevitably, the European Union’s current
member states will have to examine when considering Turkey’s accession
bid, Varjabedian also notes that “Turkey continues to be an invader of
Cyprus’s territory, a neighboring country and a member of the E.U.,”
and “[d]espite pressures from E.U. leaders … still refuses to
officially recognize the Republic of Cyprus. …” Worse, Varjabedian
suggests, is Turkey’s ongoing “repression of its Kurdish population
and other minorities … despite some reforms.” He points out that,
in Turkey, “[f]reedom of expression is often curbed; recognition of
the Armenian Genocide [which began in 1915] and statements in favor
of Turkey’s withdrawal from Cyprus are considered punishable crimes
under the newly reformed Turkish Penal Code.”
What critics of modern Turkey’s whitewashing of its history do not
respect is the way the government’s hear-no-evil, see-no-evil view
of the nation’s past is expressed in official policies. Varjabedian
notes that Ankara “threatens” countries that “recogniz[e] or [plan] to
recognize the Armenian Genocide,” and that “lands rightfully belonging
to Armenians, namely Western Armenia, are still occupied [by Turks].”
“In an attempt to conceal the Armenian identity of these lands and
erase traces of Armenian existence on them,” Varjabedian writes,
“Turkey regularly destroys centuries-old Armenian monuments.” (Daily
Star)
Positive Signs
As dark as some aspects of modern Turkey’s past may appear and, as
some critics claim, as oppressively as its government may sometimes
act today, some observers find signs of positive change in events like
a recent — and historic — conference at Istanbul’s private Bilgi
University, at which, for the first time ever in Turkey (Turkish Daily
News), speakers dared to publicly address the controversial subject
of the Ottoman Turks’ treatment of the Armenians (ArmeniaNow.com).
Although “[n]ationalist demonstrators hurled eggs and tomatoes
at participants as they arrived” for the gathering 10 days ago
(Reuters/Aljazeera.net), the twice-delayed confab went ahead (Turkish
Daily News). During the event, “[p]rotesters waved Turkish flags and
chanted slogans accusing the conference participants of betraying the
nation,” but the liberal Turkish newspaper Radikal proudly noted that
at the conference, where free speech and open discussion prevailed,
“the word ‘genocide’ was uttered … but the world is still turning,
and Turkey is still in its place.” Likewise, the daily Milliyet noted:
“Another taboo is destroyed. The conference began, but the day of
judgement did not come.” (Reuters/Aljazeera.net)
Indeed, notes Jean Gureghian, an architect, author and editor of the
newsletter of the Armenian Democratic Liberal Party, “[t]he debate over
Turkey’s entry into the European Union creates favorable conditions
under which to pressure it to recognize [the] genocide [of Armenians
during World War I], which it has denied up until now.”
Gureghian argues that no matter how hard Turkey officially tries to
deny this chapter of its modern past, “the Armenian question still
exists.” “Every crime deserves punishment, and the crime of genocide
.. deserves even more to be punished. … [T]he contemporary heirs.
of the Ottoman Empire must respond, sooner or later, to the crime
that was committed against the Armenian people and make reparations
[for it].” (Le Figaro)
Meanwhile, the internationally acclaimed Turkish author Orhan Pamuk
is set “to stand trial for writing about the [Armenian genocide]
in a recent newspaper article.”
“[A]ccording to many historians,” the Armenian genocide “claimed the
lives of some 1.5 million Armenians.” Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan
“has defended … Pamuk … but … argues [that] his hands are tied”
and that the media have “to understand that this case … does not
involve the country’s executive and legislative powers, but [rather
that of] the judiciary. It’s up to the magistrates to evaluate the
facts, and we have to respect their decisions.” (La Repubblica,
cited by ADN Kronos International)
**** Maybe, in some small ways that do not make international
headlines, some Turks have begun to acknowledge their disturbing
past — and to atone for it, too. The Times’ Ben Macintyre writes,
for example, that on “a tiny island in the middle of Lake Van,
on the far eastern edge of Turkey, a team of architects is working
feverishly to restore one of the most beautiful religious buildings
in the world.” There the correspondent for the British daily found
“Holy Cross Church, on Akdamar Island,” which “was built by the
Armenian King Gagik in [A.D.
921] and was once the spiritual focus for more than a million Armenian
Christians.”
Today, the church remains empty, for Akdamar Island’s “entire
Armenian population … was killed or driven away by Turks and Kurdish
militias during the First World War. …” Recently, though, Macintyre
reports, Muslim stonemasons began “rebuilding this church without a
congregation.” “The scaffolding-clad church is proof that attitudes
are changing but it is also a poignant symbol of how much work —
economic, political, cultural and historical — still needs to be
completed,” he writes.
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