The Turkish ambassador to the EU, Faruk Kaymakci, said on Saturday 15 July that Turkey and the EU were inseparable.
“It is not a good idea to stop accession negotiations and if we did, they would be back on track within a year or two, as the EU and Turkey are inseparable, Turkey is there whether you like it or not and it is one of the founders of many Western institutions and organisations”, he told a small group of journalists including EUROPE (our translation throughout). He pointed out that between 1997 and 1999, Turkey had cut contact with the EU, because unlike the other countries awaiting candidate status, it had not received its status. The ambassador said that “Turkish accession would be the most useful and significant and would change the image of the EU” in the Muslim world.
The accession talks, which were already tough, suffered a major setback following the aborted coup d'etat in Turkey on 15 July 2016. Since then, the relationship has been complicated. “All agreements, all points agreed (at the three summits held between October 2015 and March 2016) were suspended, except migration; we are still honouring that commitment to the migration agreement and it is working very well”, the ambassador said.
There is a delay in updating customs union, enlargement is suspended and visa liberalisation is “virtually impossible”, he said. “It is hard to meet the seven remaining criteria when there are so many refugees (3.3 million) and we are fighting the PKK, Daech and FETO”, he said, but remains optimistic. “The legislative revision may be complicated, but it is possible. We can see that the EU is taking measures: now, we have better cooperation over Daech and foreign fighters”, he said, welcoming the fact that the report of the European Parliament on Turkey calls for the symbols of terrorist organisations to be banned. The Turkish have complained that meetings featuring the PKK flag are regularly held in Europe. “If these steps are taken, it will be a positive signal for Turkey”, the ambassador stressed.
According to Kaymakci, at a meeting of 25 May, the Presidents of the European Commission and of the European Council, Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk respectively, and the Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, reaffirmed their trust. They also decided to develop a common roadmap for the coming year, based on the agreement on 18 March and covering migration, the readmission agreement, visa liberalisation, customs union, the fight against terrorism and political, economic and energy dialogue, the Turkish representative added. The next high-level political dialogue will be held in Brussels on Tuesday 25 July, Kaymakci announced. He added that there would probably be a high-level dialogue on energy in October and possibly a dialogue on the economy as well.
Kaymakci criticises EU's lack of cooperation over terrorism
With Europeans often criticising Turkey for being a transit country for foreign fighters, Kaymakci spoke out against the lack of cooperation up until recently. “We were supposed to work closely in the fight against terrorism. Europeans hesitated to work with us until recently. Up until 2014, we had the names of just 4,000 suspects”, the ambassador explained, adding that there were “probably more than 100,000 foreign fighters”. “If the countries of departure won't share intelligence with us, what can we do? The EU countries hesitated to share intelligence until there were bombs going off in their capitals. Now we have 54,000 names. But why did it take you until 2017? If you will not work with us and blame Turkey as a transit country, this will not help and will not solve our problems”, he added.
The ambassador also referred to the aborted coup d'etat in Turkey, as 15 July is the anniversary of the failed attempt. He said the Europeans had been “too slow and too weak” in their response to the incident. “The situation in Turkey is getting back to normal, there is still a state of emergency, of course, but this does not mean that we are brutal. Now, we have a lot of experience”, he explained. “We were in a terrible situation; the judiciary and police were the most-infiltrated institutions (by the Gulenists). Now we are talking about bringing them to trial as quickly and fairly as possible, in accordance with the rule of law and international conventions, but, at the same time, we may have lost 10,000 judges. This is why things are taking a bit of time”, he summed up. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)