While noting positive signs of calm in the Eastern Mediterranean, several EU Foreign Ministers and the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, expressed concern about the rule of law in Turkey on Monday 22 March.
After launching a procedure on 18 March to ban the pro-Kurdish HDP party (see EUROPE 12681/22), the Turkish authorities announced their intention to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention (see other news).
“This type of measure puts Turkey off the European path”, Mr Borrell warned after the Foreign Affairs Council. Beyond the “concerns” about the situation in the country, he said that the process of healing in the Eastern Mediterranean remained fragile and that sustained efforts were needed.
“On Turkey, there is light and shadow”, said German diplomatic chief Heiko Maas. “What we have seen in the last few days, the banning of the HDP and especially the withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention, are absolutely the wrong signals”, he added.
“The shrinking of democratic space is very worrying”, said his Swedish counterpart, Ann Linde.
On Saturday 20 March, after the announcement of Turkey’s withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention, the EU High Representative had “deeply regretted” and expressed his “incomprehension” about this decision.
The stick and the carrot
At the Foreign Affairs Council, the ministers discussed Mr Borrell’s report on relations with Turkey, which will be presented to the European Council on Thursday 25 and Friday 26 March.
In the report, which could still evolve in the meantime, Mr Borrell says that in order to “deepen the present momentum and incentivise closer EU-Turkey ties across the board”, the Union should “put a number of possible areas of cooperation on the table to allow for a progressive, proportionate and reversible approach”.
These are: – to work on migration management, including the resettlement of refugees from Turkey to the EU; – to strengthen economic ties, in particular by modernising and extending the scope of the current customs union; – to keep communication channels open, with the possibility of re-launching high-level dialogues; and finally – to increase people-to-people contacts, for example through the Erasmus+ or Horizon 2020 programmes.
“The Commission will also rapidly prepare options for continued funding for refugees and host communities in Turkey”, the report adds.
Conversely, if Turkey “[does] not move forward constructively in developing a genuine partnership with the EU”, the EU could take action, the High Representative warns. “We should foresee smart, scalable yet reversible restrictive measures, building on those in place”, he says.
According to Mr Borrell, these measures could progressively include the adoption of the lists of additional targeted measures already agreed by the December 2020 European Council, related to illegal drilling activities in the Eastern Mediterranean and the strengthening of existing sanctions frameworks, with the possibility to include legal persons (see EUROPE 12620/2).
The EU could also consider further restrictions on economic cooperation, “including on the operations of the European Investment Bank and other financial institutions”, as well as measures targeting other sectors of importance to the Turkish economy, such as tourism, energy or the import/export of certain goods and technologies.
See the report: https://bit.ly/3cajGNV (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)