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President of the European Convention, Valery Giscard d'Estaing
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BRUSSELS,
November 8 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Brussels said Thursday,
November 8, Turkish membership of the European Union would not spell
the end of the grouping, as claimed by the Frenchman chairing the
convention on Europe's future.
"I
don't have any intention of getting into a ping-pong match with Mr
Giscard d'Estaing," a spokesman for the EU's executive European
Commission, Jean-Christophe Filori, told reporters.
But
asked whether Turkey's entry into the EU would mean its end, Filori
said: "The answer is no."
Valery
Giscard d'Estaing, the chairman of the convention, mapping a strategic
vision for the EU, said in a newspaper interview Friday that Turkish
membership would mean "the end of the European Union."
Turkey
was not a European country, the former French president told Le Monde,
adding that the 15-nation bloc should instead offer Ankara a
partnership and cooperation pact.
The
AKP, a new party which has forsworn its Islamic background for a more
center-right agenda, is set to form a new Turkish government after
winning a crushing victory in elections Sunday, November 3.
AKP
leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan is preparing to embark on a tour of EU
countries ahead of a December EU summit in Copenhagen, which Turkey is
hoping will give a date for accession talks to start.
The
Copenhagen summit will formally invite 10 eastern European and
Mediterranean countries, including the divided island of Cyprus, to
join the EU in 2004.
But
Turkey, the laggard among 13 EU hopefuls, has so far been given the
cold shoulder by Brussels on the grounds that more reforms are needed.
Filori
stressed that Turkey remains a candidate to join the EU and hailed
recent reforms, such as abolition of the death penalty and rights for
Kurds, as proof of progress towards Western standards.
"This
strategy... has been a good one," he said. "Turkey has made
much more progress in the last year in the areas of human rights and
democracy than in the previous 50 years."
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