 |
Italy disagrees with Germany, France on Turkey’s EU bid
“I believe that after starting to negotiate membership with Turkey, we cannot tell them the next day: ‘It’s all over. It has all changed. We should make it a partnership’,” Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini told France24 TV.
Italy has long been a firm supporter of Turkey’s EU membership, and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is close to his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, whose visit to Paris this week ended in an “agreement to disagree” with France over Turkey’s EU membership.
Turkey rejects the partnership option proposed by Germany and France. French European Affairs Minister Pierre Lellouche said Paris favors “a big Europe, the 27 [current EU members] in a partnership with Russia and Turkey.”
“France and Germany will think about it. Italy for its part will think about it, but I believe that the right path is to keep our promises,” Frattini said. Berlusconi had talks with French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Paris on Friday.
Turkey and Italy to hold intergovernmental summit
Meanwhile, the Turkey-Italy Intergovernmental Summit, which was called off after a physical attack on Berlusconi last December, will be held on April 21, the Anka news agency reported on Friday.
Seven Turkish and eight Italian ministers initially planned to attend the summit. The summit will feature discussions on economic cooperation and energy projects in particular. In line with this, it is said the talks will primarily be about the gas pipeline projects and investment opportunities in the Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP).
It is also reported that Erdoğan will also have bilateral meeting with Berlusconi on the sidelines of the summit. During the meeting, Erdoğan and Berlusconi are expected to discuss Turkey’s EU membership talks, Iran’s nuclear standoff, the Middle East problem and the Balkans.
The first summit of the Turkish and Italian governments was held in İzmir in 2008, and the leaders decided to host the annual meetings on a rotating basis.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| BÜLENT KENEŞ |  |
||
| What befell Niyazi-i Misri in the past is happening to Fethullah Gülen now | |||
| EKREM DUMANLI |  |
||
| When a call for fairness and reason finds acceptance | |||
| ŞAHİN ALPAY |  |
||
| Uludere, test case for democracy in Turkey | |||
| EMRE USLU |  |
||
| Are the Kurds mentally divorced from Turkey? | |||
| GÖKHAN BACIK |  |
||
| Erdoğan, Gül and Davutoğlu: the inner bargain on Turkish foreign policy | |||
| MARKAR ESAYAN |  |
||
| Taking lessons from previous experiences with the military | |||
| YAVUZ BAYDAR |  |
||
| Qualm | |||
| ÖMER TAŞPINAR |  |
||
| A new phase in Syria? | |||
| İHSAN DAĞI |  |
||
| Turkish foreign policy: Time for a re-evaluation | |||
| SEYFETTİN GÜRSEL |  |
||
| Poor-friendly economic growth and the AK Party | |||
| CHARLOTTE MCPHERSON |  |
||
| Missing women, missing opportunities | |||
| BERK ÇEKTİR |  |
||
| Changes to incentives for investment in Turkey | |||
| MERVE BÜŞRA ÖZTÜRK |  |
||
| The 1960 coup: a final test for democracy | |||
| AMANDA PAUL |  |
||
| Ukraine: a lost country | |||
| MÜMTAZER TÜRKÖNE |  |
||
| The 52nd anniversary of May 27 | |||
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
