EU risks credibility loss on enlargement, Turkey says

BRUSSELS - Turkey has criticised France for giving insufficient reasons for blocking its EU talks, saying the bloc's ability to make other countries undertake democratic reform will be undermined if Ankara is pushed off the EU path.

Speaking a day after it became clear that Paris was making good on a threat to obstruct Ankara's EU talks, the country's chief negotiator, Ali Babacan, said "we are not satisfied with the technical justifications that were given to us."

France this week blocked the opening of talks on an economic and monetary union on technical grounds, with president Nicolas Sarkozy recently announcing a sea change in French policy on Turkey by saying it "has no place" in the bloc.

According to Turkey, the EU will only harm itself if it derails talks after having officially granted the mainly Muslim country EU candidate status in October 2005.

Speaking about the union, it said it had "brought stability and welfare and it has exported these values to surrounding areas.

"The European Union will continue to be strong so long as it keeps its promises," said Mr Babacan.

He added that countries in the Middle East and Africa were following the process closely. Turkey is a "very important model in showing that securalism and Islam can co-exist."

For its part, the European Commission continues to show outward support for Turkey's bid, underlining that the two chapters of talks which were opened - statistics and financial control - have "very important implications for EU membership."

Meanwhile, the German EU presidency has stressed it is now up to Portugal - as the incoming EU presidency - to deal with the problem. "It's in our strategic interest to ensure that Turkey moves towards us as opposed to any other direction," it said in a statement.

Portugal does not want borders debate

Lisbon inherits the thorny problem in July but has repeated on several occasions that "enlargement negotiations will continue" under its watch.

It also indicated that it would rather not see a debate on the final borders of the EU taking place in December, as requested by France.

"We have plenty to do. Maybe the French would like to have that debate during their presidency [in the second half of 2008]," said Portuguese EU ambassador Alvaro Mendonca on Monday (25 June).

Speaking about Mr Sarkozy's plans for a Mediterranean Union which would eventually also include Turkey, the ambassador indicated that the plans had not been thoroughly thought through.

"We have had very preliminary talks with the French [on the Mediterranean Union]," he said, adding that Paris is still "developing" its own thinking on the plan.