Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-09-26-Speech-2-200"
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"en.20060926.24.2-200"2
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".
Mr President, I should like to start by thanking Mr Eurlings for his hard work; it has not always been plain sailing. Unfortunately, the report as it now stands has, on account of the opponents of Turkish accession to the EU, become a cause for disappointment for many of us, including reform-minded Turks, those Europeans who want Turkey as an ally, and not least women in Turkey.
As rapporteur for women’s rights, I have seen that Turkey is definitely making headway in the area of women’s rights, partly as a result of pressure from the EU in general and the European Parliament, in particular. The enlargement strategy is effective in encouraging reforms in candidate states, but it only works if those reforms are also recognised. As Mr Eurlings’ party in the Netherlands likes to put it, ‘we need sweet after sour’, in other words we need light after dark.
The Eurlings report fails to recognise Turkey’s achievements to date. It is negative, not only in terms of substance, but also in its tone. That is a sure-fire way of sabotaging reforms in Turkey by undermining public support for them and by equipping Turkish eurosceptics with a powerful weapon for the forthcoming elections in Turkey. What we really want, surely, is for that criticism to be translated into action, for that will benefit everyone.
We could turn things on its head and mention reforms that have been successful, acquaint ourselves with the first steps that Turkey has taken in order to come to terms with its past and promote further attempts, but I urge you to remove acknowledgement of genocides as a condition for membership, for that does not form part of the Copenhagen criteria and has, in all fairness, never been put to any of the other Member States. All references to a privileged partnership should be deleted, for the objective of the negotiations is that a reformed Turkey should become a Member State. If these changes are made, we can keep the Turks in Europe, welcoming this secular state with its Muslim people as our ally in the fight against terrorism and extremism. If we fail to implement these changes, we will leave reformers in Turkey, millions of men and women, simply out in the cold."@en1
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