BY FERAI TINC
HURRIYET- Former French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin was in Istanbul two days ago as the guest of Turkish Industrialists' and Businessmen's Association (TUSIAD). He tried to encourage Turkey on the European Union issue during the banquet, organized in his honor and attended mostly by the businessmen. The meeting of EU-Turkey Accession Council will be held in Brussels tomorrow. France again started to exclude the word 'accession' from relevant documents. It has done the same thing during last December's summit as well. This time Foreign Minister Ali Babacan displayed a harsher and more determined stance and thus the word 'accession' wasn't excluded, but the result will be clear in Brussels today. There is something clear in Europe. France, which has previously supported Turkey and opened the road for its candidacy, is now the one creating obstacles on it.
De Villepin has just pointed out this issue, saying that he's concerned over Europe's future and that the Lisbon Agreement wouldn't be able to save Europe from this difficult situation, either. De Villepin thinks that Europe lacks the capacity to overcome the complex struggle which is required to include a country like Turkey. 'A Europe without Turkey is impossible,' said Villepin. Do you think he thinks differently than French President Nicolas Sarkozy only on this issue? No, but he reaches this conclusion, as he makes a different analysis of Europe. Sarkozy says that Europe's security depends on NATO, of which Turkey has already been a member. On the contrary, de Villepin thinks that NATO is now an American tool, through which the US influences and directs its allies.
For de Villepin, the problem is about whether the EU will continue to exist with its own values in the 21st century or not. Europe is now facing such a critical problem and it's also too small to be able to face the needs of this century, because it has a low population and a limited geography. Europe should include Turkey in order to be able to embrace the 21st century. De Villepin told us these things in order to show how two French politicians from the same party consider Turkey differently. De Villepin also said that Sarkozy was temporary and told us to ignore the problems caused by him and continue our relations with the EU by fulfilling our responsibilities. By the way, I would like to remind you of the fact that de Villepin is getting ready for this year's elections in France.
Is he really talking about ignoring about them? Unfortunately, these suggestions from Europe are inapplicable. Is this possible not to worry about a driver who always changes gears? When we say that we will harmonize with the acquis communautaire not for the EU, it doesn't spark a realistic and transforming reform process. So telling us to ignore it and think about the period in the next 20 years aren't sufficient to accelerate this process, either. Only one chapter was opened and closed in two years, there is Greek Cypriots' veto on eight chapters and membership talks on five chapters are underway. The process of screening is very slow. This process will be slower, considering the conditions for opening new chapters. If the EU-Turkey Accession Council is carried out tomorrow, it means Ankara's stake was influential on this. As de Villepin said, the EU membership process is very complicated. We shouldn't ignore this.