Time to Take
Turkey Into Europe
By JONATHAN POWER
LONDON-- Once again in Europe the discussion about
admitting new members is coming to the boil and, once again
Turkey, promised membership of the Union over 30 years ago,
is not on the list. In fact it is even worse than that.
Turkey is being actively blackballed. At a get-together of
European Christian Democrats in March a prominent member,
Wilfried Martens, was widely quoted as saying, "The European
Union is in the process of building a civilization in which
Turkey has no place." It was also widely noted that another
participant, Chancellor Helmut Kohl of Germany made no
effort, unlike other leaders present, to distance himself
from Mr. Martens.
The hand of European chauvinism is again being dealt to
Turkey, home to Istanbul, the city that strides two
continents, the only city to have served as the capital of
three empires, the historic meeting place of east and west,
cradle of Christian Byzantium as well as Ottoman Islam. It
was Napoleon Bonaparte, the first practical pan-European,
who said, "If the world were a single state, its capital
would be Istanbul."
What is it then that blocks Turkey from assuming its
natural position as the easternmost flank of Europe, a role
it has played quite happily as a member of NATO since
1960?
It is its state of economic development, its human rights
record, or its religion? It is a bit of all three, but none
are totally convincing if looked at with even a modicum of
good sense.
Turkey, admittedly, is still a developing country with
high inflation, a heavy load of debt, a growing
maldistribution of income and over-rapid urbanization.
Nevertheless, according to the World Economic Forum, Turkey
is ahead of Greece, not to mention its rivals for European
membership, Poland and Hungary, in a league table that
compares a wide range of major indicators, including
domestic economic strength, financial prowess, standing in
science and technology and soundness of governmental
economic leadership. It is certainly as well placed
economically as were Spain, Greece and Portugal when they
negotiated entry.
The human rights story, in contrast, is as painfully true
as outsiders paint it, although there are many insiders, not
least the late president Turgut Ozal, who have worked hard
over the years to get their country's house in order.
Torture is still practiced widely as a recent report from
Human Rights Watch underlines. The war against the dissident
Kurds continues with an obsessive ruthlessness. Promises
made by foreign minister, Tansu Ciller, to eliminate torture
have not been kept.
It is powerful hard line elements in the army who make it
difficult for civilian leaders to reach out to the
accommodation now being offered by Abdullah Ocalan, the
leader of the Kurdish insurgency. If America didn't feel
itself so obsessively in hock to the Turkish military in its
quest to keep Iraq isolated and Iran and Syria on the
defensive it could use the muscle of its large scale
military assistance and arms sales, much of which is used to
fight the Kurds, to push Turkey to be more accommodating. So
far Washington has refused to do more than talk, even that
rather discreetly.
However, the most worthwhile approach to the Kurds on the
human rights question is not the stick but the carrot. The
carrot of the customs union with the European Union,
introduced last year, led to some progress on improving the
state of Turkey's prisons. If Turkey knew it had a real
chance of entering Europe it would probably house clean
rather rapidly. The incentive has certainly worked in
central Europe, where a number of potential ethnic disputes
have been sorted out surprisingly quickly once the lure of
membership was dangled before them.
On the religious question the European reaction, judged
by the comments of politicians and the reports of the media,
is too often of the knee-jerk variety. It sees the present
government as some sort of Islamic Trojan Horse. Although
there is for the first time since Ataturk an Islamic
government in power in Turkey it needs to be underlined that
the Islamic Refah Party won only 21% of the vote and that
its power base depends on its precarious alliance with Tansu
Ciller's True Path party which only agreed to the coalition
to save Mrs. Ciller from being prosecuted for corruption
charges hanging over her from her days as prime minister.
Moreover the current row, army provoked, about the
government's effort to Islamize schools is much exaggerated.
After all when the army itself was in power in the early
1980s it introduced mandatory religious instruction in the
public schools and financially supported religious schools.
It is true that the army now is seriously worried about the
pace of the present revival of Islam. But confrontation will
only feed it and it gives hostages to fortune in the likes
of Mr. Martens and Chancellor Kohl. The truth is that Prime
Minister Necmettin Erbakan's Refah party remains a
conservative, mainstream party, committed to NATO and, deep
down, like most Turks, eager for swift entry into Europe.
Indeed, so earnest is its desire, it has threatened to block
NATO's expansion into central Europe unless Turkey gets its
way on EU membership.
Europe should take the historic leap and invite Turkey to
join the union. It is as bad for Europe to be isolated as a
"Christian club" as it would be for Turkey to feel banished
to the Islamic world. Europe should not draw such lines on
the map. They are most definitely counterproductive and
ultimately they could be dangerous.
May 14, 1997,
LONDON
Copyright © 1997 By JONATHAN POWER
Note: I can be reached by phone +44 385 351172
and e-mail: JonatPower@aol.com
|