Japon Televizyonuna Mülakat (İng.)

CHP GENEL BAŞKAN YARDIMCISI SAYIN ONUR ÖYMEN’İN JAPON TELEVİZYONUNA VERDİĞİ MÜLAKAT
3 HAZİRAN 2005
We understand that there are several groups that are ideologically different but opposing the Constitution. On the one hand there are extreme rightists, on the other hand there are communists and a part of socialists. They all voted “no” for the Constitution. There should be a common reason for that. We think that the people were not consulted enough during the preparation of this Constitution. It was a work of a group of elite and the people were not properly consulted.

Secondly, some expectations of the people were not taken into consideration. So main characteristic of this constitution is rather liberal conception. Thirdly, the people in France and Holland knew that the Constitution gave too much power to Brussels. Apparently they are not ready to deliver so much authority to the European institutions.

Those are some reasons. On the top of that those who argued for a novel used the Turkish element as well. They told the people that if they vote “yes” to the Constitution, they would also vote for the membership of Turkey. Indeed the Constitution has nothing to do with the Turkish membership. There are German Christian Democrats and the French UMP and some other parties in Europe, which are objecting full membership of Turkey to the European Union for several reasons. Irrespective of the referendum of the Constitution, they are against Turkish membership.

We know that some parties in France such as the party in power, UMP, and its leader Nicholas Sarkozy are against the full membership of Turkey perhaps for internal political reasons. What was surprising was that President Chirac was known as the supporter of Turkish membership who gave up to the pressures of negative groups before the referendum. He urged the Parliament to change the Constitution to make the Turkish membership process subject to the consent of the French people at the end. This means that the change of French Constitution in such a way that if we finish all the process of membership, this will be submitted to French people for approval. For the first time France changed its Constitution to make this referendum for enlargement compulsory. This was surprising. For the last 32 years France did not resort to a referendum for the membership of other candidates. Last time they went to referendum was for Britain in 1972. Therefore we are disappointed. We do not consider this move as a friendly action.

According to the conditions stipulated by the Nice Treaty, which is still in power now, we, hopefully, will join the European Union. We believe that the ratification of the Constitution will be a step forward for the deepening of the European Union, but at least at this moment this is not the case. Probably, there will be a new arrangement with the basis of mutual agreement. These arrangements will make the Constitution slightly different from the existing one. Since we are hoping to join the European Union, we are very much interested in an objective ideology of the Union. Therefore we have our support to the European Constitution. We regret that the two important founding members of the European Union have not accepted it.

In 1999 December our candidate status has been agreed and formalized. Moreover it was also agreed that Turkey would be subjected to the same criteria applied to other candidate countries. So there would be no additional condition for Turkey. Unfortunately, 17th December 2005 decision of the European Union was not in conformity with 1999 decision. We said that we are ready to fulfill all the requirements brought by the acquis communaitre but we did not want any other additional condition which had nothing to do with the principles stipulated by the acquis. So if there is a practice implemented by all European countries, such as the abolition of the death penalty we have already accepted it. But if you ask from Turkey some conditions that are not implemented even in EU countries, you have to resist to such demands.

Besides that there was no more a commitment from the EU side for the full membership of Turkey. Only for Turkey it was written in the text of the conclusion of 2004 Brussels Summit that negotiations will be open-ended. So the negotiations may not end with the full membership. If Turkey is not accepted as a full member, then there should be special arrangements and ties between EU and Turkey. No such a language is used for the other candidates.

Another decision was that Turkey would be submitted to permanent restrictions in the field of free circulation of people, which is against the basic treaties of the European Union, because free circulation of people is one of the four main freedoms of the European Union. So in case Turkey is forced to be deprived of one of these basic rights we would not be a full member of the European Union. So the concept of the 17th December is not a concept that clearly shows that the way of full membership is open. Now we will witness the German elections on September. The party, which is seen as the favorite party of these elections, is the Christian Democrats. This party and its leader, Angela Merkel, are against the Turkish membership; they are in favor of a special status. French government party and German will-be government party are against Turkish full membership. This means that by the autumn of this year we have to face two big difficulties from two founding members of the European Union. The government party in Austria is also in favor of special status rather than full membership. We are very much disappointed because of the direction of German and French parties; because, they did not say that they might support Turkish membership in case Turkey fulfils this or that condition. They say that they are against Turkish membership irrespective of the achievements of Turkey. This means that we should be excluded from the European union because we are Turks. This is such discrimination that it is totally incompatible with contemporary European values. We have to fight with such concepts, such ideas because it is not the Europe that we are planning to join.

Turkish people are very patient but they are also full aware of our interests. National pride in Turkey is very strong. We may digest some criticism but we cannot digest discrimination. We cannot digest to be seen as a second-class candidate. Whatever the reason for it, we cannot accept it. So it is a shame that some European parties consider the cultural and religious differences as an element that separates Turkey from Europe. So we have to stand very firm against such policies and approaches.

In diplomacy, it is not enough to use some arguments. You have to use some leverages. Countries like Turkey has some leverage. In this part of the world, every day, we are facing a number of demands. In case we use our leverages, we may perhaps have a better image to our European partners. They may understand that Turkey is serious in this business as we are not ready to accept discrimination.

A solution to Cyprus problem should be a fair solution. Cyprus was a state established by an international agreement based on the concept of two communities having equal rights. So Turks had a proportional place in the Parliament, government and judiciary. In 1963 they were kicked out of all state organs. Greek Cypriots took over the government by force. Today there is not a single Turkish citizen in the Greek Cypriot political system. So today the situation is a clear violation of the founding agreements of Cyprus. Moreover, these agreements stipulated that Cyprus could join to an international organization, only if Turkey and Greece are members of that organization. Accepting Cyprus as a member to the European Union is a clear violation of these agreements as well. There are reports of international lawyers who conferred that this was a clear violation. Now, a new solution could be found. Kofi Annan has proposed a solution, a plan, which had a lot of deficiencies for the Turkish Cypriots. Still Turkish Cypriots voted ‘yes’ and the Greek Cypriots voted ‘no’. As a result, you might expect that the Turkish Cypriots would be rewarded and Greek Cypriots would be punished. The outcome was the just opposite. Greek Cypriots were accepted as a member of the European Union, and unjust and illegal international embargoes against the Turkish Cypriots remained in force. So a new solution, we believe should be based on the realities of Cyprus, which means the equality of two entities, two democracies. We have to find a common denominator, which would respect the equality of both sides. Turkish Cypriots would never accept to be a minority. They want to preserve the right that they had been acquired from the founding agreements of Cyprus.

At this moment the EU is pressing Turkey for signing a protocol to validate the 1963 EU-Turkey Association Agreement to the new members of the Union, one of which is Cyprus. If this validation will be made then it means that Turkey recognized the Greek Cypriots as the sovereign power over the whole island. Therefore the Turkish government should put a reservation that the validation of the 1963 Agreement to the new members would not mean that Turkey recognizes Cyprus. Otherwise, we discontinue to recognize the TRNC. You cannot have double sovereignty on the same peace of land. So we should avoid any legal action that might lead to the recognition of the Greek Cypriots as the sovereign authority over the whole island.

What is more this protocol was not signed with those members of the EU, which entered to the Union in 1995, namely Finland, Austria and Sweden. So for ten years we have not enlarged the protocol towards them, and there was no pressure at all on Turkey to do so. Why then is there so much pressure on Turkey to sign these protocol with the new members? The only reason is that the Greek Cypriots is expecting some practical advantages with the signing of this protocol. They want to benefit from the Turkish ports and harbors whereas they prohibited the Turkish Cypriot ships to benefit from their own ports. So it would be an imbalanced situation. But they pressed forward and unfortunately EU shares this view as well. We believe that it is completely unjust and we urge our government not to accept these concessions.

We believe that the Turkish membership to the European Union will be the last step of the main tenets of our Republic. We share the same values like democracy, human rights, secularism, etc. We have economic and security interests as well. The reasons why we want to join the EU are not much different of so many European countries, which wanted to join the EU in the last couple of years. There is a general tendency that there are formations of some groups throughout the world such as NAFTA, ASEAN or the EU. So it would be unjust to accept from Turkey to stand alone against all these developments in the world. So EU and Turkey had common interest in the full membership of Turkey. That’s why we aim to join the EU. Turkey would also have economic benefits such as free circulation of goods and services in the European Union.

We may also contribute to the security and defense dimension of the European Union. Turkey is a member of NATO but not yet a member of the EU. Since EU is becoming a security power it would be better for Turkey to be in rather than to be out. So for all these political, ideological, economic and security reasons, we want to join the European Union.

What is more we have the potential to be full member of the EU before the time that is foreseen for Turkey. We are not behind those East European states, which had already been members of the European Union, or those, which will be the members of the Union in 2007. We have much older democracy than most of the EU countries. We have had a free market economy for decades. We have much potential than many new members of the Union. Our economy is greater and our population is younger. The aging population in Europe is a problem; therefore, our population potential will help the EU to overcome this problem. We will bring our cultural experience and contributions to Europe. We will bring our military potential and capabilities. So we are not going to join the EU as a beneficiary, but also as a contributing party. We may contribute more than what we may take from the Union. We believe that Turkish membership will be beneficial for both sides. But those opponents to the Turkish membership of the EU cannot wholly grasp the benefits of this membership and they perceive Turkey as a burden. This should be better explained and we believe that in Turkey government and the opposition should work together to explain European public that all these contributions of Turkish membership.