ANKARA - Turkish Council of Ministers reviewed prior legal arrangements to be made on the road to European Union (EU) membership process, Turkish State Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Abdullatif Sener said on Monday.
Following the meeting of the Council of Ministers, Sener told reporters that the report on the progress made by Turkey on the road to EU membership to be unveiled by the EU was important for setting a date to start Turkey's EU full membership negotiations.
Sener said, ''we should complete the laws that should be passed in this legislative year till then in order to enable the EU to give place to these reforms in its progress report.''
Turkey's Secretary General for EU Murat Sungar explained the cabinet Turkey's situation on the road to EU membership, Sener stated.
Sener said, ''EU will set a negotiation date for Turkey in its summit due in December. Issues and evaluations in the progress report will have importance for setting this negotiation date. This progress report is expected to be unveiled in the first week of October.''
''Therefore, we should complete the laws that should be passed in this legislative year till then in order to enable the EU to give place to these reforms in its progress report. You know that meeting political criteria is our priority. In our meeting, we reviewed prior legal arrangements to be made. But, only making legal arrangements is not enough. Reforms should also be put into practice. Therefore, implementation of laws to be passed in coming days is also a basic issue to take place in the progress report. To this end, we also discussed implementation of new laws and reforms in our meeting,'' Sener added.
EU is expected to give a date to start full membership negotiations with Turkey in its summit due in December.
(BRC-AÖ) 17.05.2004