Turkey's demands to fix terms for EU membership aroused perplexity
Recep Erdogan's demand to fix concrete terms for accepting Turkey in the European Union has aroused perplexity in Brussels: on a number of issues the sides have not began negotiations up till now. During the last weekend during his visit to Germany Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan demanded from EU more concrete perspectives for his country's membership to the Union. Particularly he offered German Chancellor Angela Merkel to work out a "road map" and fix a date for Turkey's accession to the EU.
Angela Merkel did not react to this demand anyhow. Instead the European Commission and European Parliament expressed a rather simple reaction. "No candidates for EU membership will be given exact dates for accession to the Union," a representative of the European Commission stated. Still in December of 2006 heads of EU member-states adopted a decision, according to which henceforth the concrete date for membership will be discussed only during the final stage of talks.
In the case with Turkey negotiations are only in the initial stage, and still not on all subjects. The main obstacle remains the same, the "Cyprus issue": the sides blame each other for blockading the negotiation process.
Head of Liberal faction Graham Watson advised Ankara to "keep calm" and stop pressing on German government, which holds EU presidency till the end of June 2007. According to Watson, currently it is necessary to first of all concentrate on continuation of negotiations, Deutsche Welle reports.
Angela Merkel did not react to this demand anyhow. Instead the European Commission and European Parliament expressed a rather simple reaction. "No candidates for EU membership will be given exact dates for accession to the Union," a representative of the European Commission stated. Still in December of 2006 heads of EU member-states adopted a decision, according to which henceforth the concrete date for membership will be discussed only during the final stage of talks.
In the case with Turkey negotiations are only in the initial stage, and still not on all subjects. The main obstacle remains the same, the "Cyprus issue": the sides blame each other for blockading the negotiation process.
Head of Liberal faction Graham Watson advised Ankara to "keep calm" and stop pressing on German government, which holds EU presidency till the end of June 2007. According to Watson, currently it is necessary to first of all concentrate on continuation of negotiations, Deutsche Welle reports.
