An untenable situation. The state of play over the Turkey dossier gives rise to a considerable amount of confusion. No sooner had the European Commission announced its approach (see our bulletin 8980) than the reactions started flying thick and fast, very often in a negative sense. The Commission is not responsible for this situation, because whatever it does, it will come under fire. If it had asked for breathing space instead of opening negotiations on the earmarked date, it would have been criticised for encouraging the EU to flout its commitments and fly in the face of a unanimous decision by the European Council. It's not the Commission that's in the wrong, it's the situation which is untenable. The declaration by Elmar Brok is significant: he accuses the Commission of failing to take the message of the general public on board, which is one of mistrust regarding subsequent waves of enlargement; by backing the decision of principle of the heads of government without taking account of popular feeling, the Commission, he feels, is proving that it is nothing more than a secretariat of the European Council. Mr Brok also hopes that at least one government will stand up and block the Commission's initiative. Let's not forget that, even though he's speaking here personally, he is still the president of the committee on external relations of the European Parliament. At the same time, Angela Merkel, who may soon be the Federal Chancellor, confirmed that she recommends that the EU's position be revised, to offer Turkey not accession, but a privileged partnership. If the German position moves towards this conclusion, would the French President consider himself still bound by the commitments entered into with the current Chancellor to support the Turkish candidacy?
With that in mind, here is a small sample of the confusion caused by the Union's current attitude.
a) The need to take account of the discontentment of the citizens towards the EU is hammered home all day long by political leaders, led by Tony Blair. Popular feeling towards new waves of accession cannot be the exception to this rule, up to the point at which the Commissions announced intentions of informing and explaining might have been able to change people's perception;
b) Among the conditions for Turkish accession, the Commission included the need for the EU to be in a position to "absorb" Turkey. But movement towards this objective would happen during the negotiation process. This formula is unrealistic, because I fail to see how, if negotiations go to term, the EU could turn round at the last minute and announce that it didn't have the capacity to welcome Turkey after all, for internal reasons. In fact, all the studies that have been carried out indicate that the EU would not be able to apply current rules on regional funding and agricultural support to Turkey. In practice, the only solution would be to empty the CAP and the cohesion policy of all its content. By extraordinary coincidence, that's precisely Tony Blair's plan for the budget!
c) The "chapter by chapter” system of negotiations neglects the preliminary question of defining the geographical borders of the European Union, a factor which is considered a political priority as part of the "pause for thought" on its nature and ambitions. Turkey's (indisputable) involvement in the history of Europe should not have any influence on this reflection. There are many other third countries who have been involved in Europe's history and who have taken an active part in wars between European countries, some of them fairly recently, but that does not make them European. The "chapter by chapter" negotiations should continue and not replace the preliminary political and geographical evaluation;
d) The EU must have close, friendly and deep relations with Turkey, but it is up to it to define the nature of them. The United States have nothing to do with this reflection, just as it is not to Europe's place to intervene (as it would not dream of doing) in relations between the United States and the countries which are on a close and friendly footing with it. Furthermore, Washington does not give the impression that it confuses close links with accession to the USA.
The Council of Europe is not a precedent. I do not believe that the solution decided upon in 1994 by the Council of Europe to define its geographical boundaries should be a significant precedent for the EU, because the nature of the two organisations is radically different in terms of transfer of sovereignty, institutional function and financial responsibility. The EU could take greater advantage of the powers and tasks of the Council of Europe on democracy, freedom and human rights, to free up its analyses on future waves of accession to concentrate on other aspects, without any need to retain the "Copenhagen criteria" as its sole method of evaluation. (F.R.)