BRUSSELS, Feb 27 (Reuters) - The European Commission assured Turkish
Foreign
Minister Ismail Cem on Tuesday that his country's raging financial
crisis would not harm its
bid to join the European Union.
"I told Mr Cem that the EU feels the financial crisis does not affect
relations between Turkey
and the Union or Turkey's membership prospects," Enlargement Commissioner
Guenter
Verheugen told reporters.
The Turkish lira fell up to a third against the dollar after Ankara
was forced to abandon its
control of the currency last week amid market turmoil sparked by a
row between the prime
minister and president over political corruption.
Verheugen made clear that the EU remained more concerned about Ankara's
human rights
record, the powerful role of the military in politics and its treatment
of minorities like the
Kurds.
"We are not talking about the accession of Turkey, but the pre-accession.
Our focus now is
to guarantee that Turkey is able to fulfil the political accession
criteria," he said.
"Only then can we make a decision on whether we can negotiate on Turkey's
accession,"
Verheugen said.
Of 13 candidate countries, mostly from ex-communist central and eastern
Europe, only
Turkey has still to begin negotiations, due to continuing worries about
its democratic
credentials.
On Monday, the EU's foreign ministers formally approved an accession
partnership with
Turkey which maps out the reforms it
must make to qualify for membership.
Cem said that, in response, Turkey would publish by late March a programme
of action
setting out how it intends to prepare its economy and political institutions
for membership.
Despite Verheugen's soothing words, EU diplomats and political analysts
say privately that
Turkey's financial woes are bound to complicate and slow down its membership
bid.
Some EU commentators question whether Turkey, a largely Muslim country
of 65 million
straddling the Balkans and the Middle East, really belongs in the affluent
Western club at
all.
Turkey was accepted as an official EU candidate at the Helsinki summit
in 1999.
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The
Kurdistan Observer
www.kurdistanobserver.com