BERLIN - German President Johannes Rau said that the European Union (EU)'s giving a negotiation date to Turkey was still early.
Rau held a press conference and responded the questions.
Stating that people saw that 15 countries have constituted the EU in 40 years when they looked at the history of the union, Rau said that the number of countries in the union would increase to 25 in 2004.
Rau said that there were two significant issues, stating that firstly every country should fulfil membership criteria and secondly EU should be ready to accept the new members. He said that in this respect, he believed that new candidate countries should not be given perspective now.
Noting that Turkey was making reforms, Rau said that but the new government should also continue to make reforms. He stated that he believed that it was early to give a concrete date to Turkey for its membership negotiations.
German President said that the United States' supporting Turkey in strategic aspect was understandable and added that neighbors of a country should be taken into consideration when accepting it as a member of the union. Rau said that every country which protected common values should be a member of EU, provided that it fulfiled the criteria.
Stressing that the dialogue was very important among the religions, Rau said that the important thing was to hold talks with the people who had radical thoughts, as the problems could only be solved by mutual talks.
Upon the question on President Ahmet Necdet Sezer's visit to Germany on November 26 and 27, Rau said that he was very pleased with Sezer's visit to Germany and added that they would have a friendly meeting. Rau said that he would inform Sezer about Turkish people's contributions to German economy.