After all, who's in charge here? From Reuters, with thanks to Anthony:
ANKARA/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Turkey has bristled at a toughening of conditions for its bid to open European Union membership talks, including an explicit mention of torture, but Cyprus says the terms are not tough enough."It is the just expectation of the Turkish nation that the EU member countries decide to open negotiations in 2005 without delay or (fresh)
conditions, with the aim of Turkey's membership of the Union," the country's political and military leaders said in a solemn joint statement on Tuesday 10 days before EU leaders decide.It came after the latest draft of next week's summit statement showed Ankara will have to prove it is implementing EU law rather than just
enacting it to progress towards membership.The text circulated by the Dutch EU presidency also called on Turkey to settle disputes that could affect its accession bid through the
International Court of Justice if necessary.And it stuck to a requirement that Turkey tacitly recognise Cyprus as one of the 10 new EU member states despite Ankara's reluctance to
do so.Nicosia demanded full recognition before talks start and Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende said the EU "cannot be satisfied with
the situation that now exists" and urged Turkey to make a move towards recognising Cyprus before the summit.With the cherished prize of a start date for negotiations within his grasp, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey had done all it could to ensure that EU leaders agree on December 17 to open talks, and its partners should now keep their word.
"Turkey has fulfilled all the political criteria," he told a rare joint news conference with opposition leader Deniz Baykal, convened to show political consensus on the EU question.
Asked about the mention of the word torture in the new draft, Erdogan said curtly: "Our sensitivity on torture and similar issues is well
known."
Why doesn't somebody ask this dissembling scoundrel what his Minister of Justice, Cemil Cicek, meant when he said in Iran that Turkey "is ready to make use of Iran's judicial experiences"?
News from Turkey:
http://www.apostatesofislam.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=661
http://theturkeynews.net/
http://www.turkishpress.com/
http://www.zaman.org/
http://www.turks.us/
http://www.turkishdailynews.com/
http://www.dunyagazetesi.com.tr/lobby_eng.asp?dept_id=87
http://www.topix.net/world/turkey
http://www.wwhr.org/
Next to the US elections, this event - EU acceptance of Turkey will more than any othwer political event deciode the flow of events in the yuesrs to come. We should all be watching this carefully.
"Why doesn't somebody ask this dissembling scoundrel about his Minister of Justice, Cemil Cicek, meanst when he said in Iran that Turkey "is ready to make use of Iran's judicial experiences"?"
Gish, that's bloody glaring! And don't forget, the Turks continue to deny the Armenian Genocide. Just like its a crime to deny the holocaust in Germany, let Turkey make it a crime to deny their past crimes as well.
So tell me... what happens if Cyprus votes to keep the Turks out? Is one vote enough? Is there any organized effort in any of the EU countries to vote against Turkey's admission? Should we start one?
Turkey will not be admitted to the E.U., and should not be admitted. If the secularist Turks take offense, they should place the blame where it belongs: on the behavior of Muslims, but especially of such Muslim states as the Islamic Republic of Iran (the 25 years of uninterrupted atrocities in Iran, right next door to Turkey, have not been exploited by the Turkish secularists, so smug in their Kemalist legacy that they fail to realize that legacy requires constant shoring-up), and of course, the behavior of Al Qaeda, Hamas, Hezbollah, Laskar Jihad, Gemaa Islamiyah, and a thousand other groups and groupuscules, not to mention the new understanding of Islam that is gradually seeping into the European consciousness, despite the best efforts of the ruling elites to prevent such comprehension.
Over the past year, many times the subject of Turkey's rejection has been discussed here, and many times it has been suggested that in Washington and in the chanceries of Europe, there has to be a concerted effort to make sure that the rejection is not used by the forces of Islam within Turkey to undo Kemalism altogether and draw Turkey even closer to the Arabs and Iranians than Erdogan has already done (and comments by important Turkish figures claiming that the Americans in Iraq are "worse than the Nazis" should give all those who are stuck in a time-warp about "our ally Turkey" not merely pause, but cause them to see that what matters in Turkey are not so much the existence of American bases -- which are valueless if they cannot be used -- but the example of how Islam is constrained. Everything must be done to prevent the admission of Turkey into the E.U., which would mean Turks, newly re-islamized as the Turks in Germany have been, could live anywhere in Schengenland, could build mosques and madrasas -- and what is more, how many non-Turkish Muslims would be able to use Turkey as a convenient gateway to Europe? And at the same time, everything must be done to make sure that Turkish secularists understand that this is perfectly reasonable behavior by Infidels determined not to allow more Muslim genies out of more bottles -- and if they don't understand why, that's too bad. Meanwhile, if they care about their own position, they will plan to use that rejection against Erdogan and those who favor even more distancing from the Kemalist reforms.
The rejection of Turkey should be a shot across assorted bows: this far, and no farther. The people of Europe must declare, in some way, some how, with or without their supposed leaders: We are not going to surrender our civilzation, unworthy heirs as we may be of Michelangelo and Spinoza, St. Augustine and Hume, Bach and Mozart, Shakespeare and Dante and Pushkin. We have no right to squander or toss it away becuase at the moment so many crooks and fools --Jacques Chirac and Javier Solana come to mind -- happen to hold positions of power.
The Turkish secularists should be made an offer: work with us, to use the rejection to push Turkey back on the road to secularism (and somewhere along the line, that road is going to include owning up to past atrocities that were committed, not by Turks against Armenians, but by Muslims (Turks and Kurds) against Christian Armenians.
No more words out of Washington urging the admission of Turkey, please. Get a head on your shoulders. Get a grip. See Islam for what it is, not what the plausible entourage of the King of Bahrain, or nice Ambassador Francke, or that Arab lady from whom Paul Wolfowitz apparently learned so much about how to transform Iraq -- learn from Ibn Warraq, Ali Sina, and the defectors from Islam, and the great scholars of Islam whose works can easily be located, even if 97% of the membership of MESA is devoted to suppressing those works.
On the street, when a beggar threatens violence or makes demands on his target to give him what he wants, he becomes a mugger. The correlation to what's going on here is obvious, and the result terminal for Europe should they give in.
Hugh's right - Washington needs to shut its trap and let Turkey fall on its sword.