High stakes for Turkey and Macedonia in EU reports
The European Commission will on Wednesday (9 November) issue a bushel of reports on EU candidate states and Western Balkan hopefuls, with most at stake for Turkey and Macedonia.
Turkey will witness the publication of what is expected to be a highly critical account of its human rights situation in the yearly Brussels "progress report" accompanied by a reviewed medium-term "accession partnership" document.
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The commission, which was careful not to let human rights rows interfere with the opening of accession talks with Ankara on 3 October, is now set to speak clearly to the Turks.
One issue that is likely to figure in the report is the Pamuk affair, which enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn has on several occasions termed a "provocation".
The affair concerns a Turkish author who was charged by Turkish prosecutors for having mentioned the 1915 Armenian genocide in a newspaper interview.
Brussels is further set to tell Turkey that it must stop torture, allow freedom of worship and limit the powers of the military in the next two years if it is to join the EU by 2015.
The other official candidate state which got the green light from Brussels to open talks on 3 October, Croatia, will also see a progress report, with one concern for Brussels being high corruption in the country.
Co-operation by the Croatians with the UN's international war crimes tribunal is also likely to figure in the reports.
D-day for Macedonia?
For Macedonia, tomorrow could be D-Day, with media reports speculating that the country might get Brussels' nod for an official candidate status before the end of the year.
Greece objects to the "Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia" carrying the name "Macedonia" but Greek officials have signalled that it will not veto rapid candidate status for the country.
Meanwhile, Bosnia, Serbia and Montenegro will receive their first Brussels judgement on their reform records after entering into preliminary "Stabilisation and Association Agreement" (SAA) negotiations with Brussels, a status preceding any official membership talks.
Both countries recently received the go-ahead from EU leaders to start the talks, with Belgrade starting the first round of talks on Monday (7 November).
Albania has already been conducting SAA talks since February 2003, but progress has lagged, with organised crime, human trafficking, money laundering and corruption impeding the conclusion of an SAA deal.
Strategy paper
Along with the bulk of country reports, Brussels will also issue its annual general enlargement strategy paper.
A commission source said the paper is set to highlight "consolidation, conditionality and communication" mentioned earlier by enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn.
Referring to "consolidation" Mr Rehn said in a July speech that the concerns of Europeans who believe that enlargement is moving too fast should be taken into account.
The commission should move away from regarding enlargement as a purely technical matter while improving communication, he added.
"Conditionality" in Mr Rehn's view means a strict application of EU membership conditions.
The commission in October threatened to delay Romania and Bulgaria`s entry date because of insufficient fulfilment of conditions.