Turkey may complete them within 15 years (by 2023, the centenary of its founding) and Croatia by 2011. Other Balkan countries have been told they can join the EU one day, if they meet the criteria.
Turkish accession to the EU over the next decade or so is expected to change both Turkey and the EU significantly in terms of economics, culture and politics. In order to make sure that this change will be for the better, both sides need to develop a common vision aimed at a win-win result with a forward-looking vision from the outset. Otherwise, the accession negotiations will continue with the serious risk(s) of failure if they are left to normal negotiation procedures.
EU leaders and the public at large should judge Turkey on the basis of its potential economic, cultural, demographic and geo-strategic importance from today to 2023, and what the future will hold for Europe at that time -- not on the narrow, short-term concerns and interests of today.
Yet, even after almost half a decade of engagement with the EU membership process, there is still much controversy about whether Turkey is a European country, on the basis that only 3 percent of its territory lies in geographic Europe, and that its capital lies in Asia as well. The perceived reluctance of many existing member states to proceed with the accession of Turkey to the EU is also based on doubts over whether a country with a population which is more than 95 percent Muslim can conform to what many perceive as a Christian basis to the "European" identity.
There are also many other economic and political arguments that have been posed against Turkish membership, but which fail the acid test when compared with the poor track record of the countries which have recently joined , Bulgaria and Romania, who lag behind Turkey in many respects.
The EU's current accession negotiations with Ankara remain "an open process, the outcome of which cannot be guaranteed beforehand." There have never before been accession negotiations that are so controversial among EU member states and so charged with uncertainty and facing such serious political and economic impediments as Turkish accession is now. It is absolutely essential that both sides agree on an imaginative, constructive problem-solving approach to produce a successful conclusion to this process.
It is equally, or even more important, to ensure that the negotiations will pave the way for EU governments at the end of the process to convince their inhabitants that Turkey does not enter the Union as an "alien" but as a truly "European" society and state, while at the same time respecting its culture, religion and priorities. This should be declared a priority from the very beginning -- something that is missing at the moment. It goes without saying that the process begun by Europe's leaders in Brussels will have to be completed by the politicians of the future -- probably over the course of at least two or three new governments in every EU country.
Given the high degree of domestic controversy that the Turkish dossier causes, governments may not have any interest in keeping the Turkish accession issue visibly on the public agenda until such a time that positive public perception of Turkey would be able to be generated. Most EU leaders would prefer to put the issue on the backburner by "leaving the concrete task of preparing and conducting the negotiations mainly to the European Commission."
However, it is important that EU governments commit a greater degree of political attention to the negotiations than they have so far done in the negotiations. And this attention should be constantly present throughout the accession process and not be restricted to the "crucial dossiers" or "crucial moments," such as the free movement of people, the common agricultural policy and issues over finance and institutions. If it were left to the normal procedures of negotiation, the process leading to its conclusion would likely encounter serious risks of failure along the way.
Therefore, accession negotiations are (and must be) aimed at full membership, avoiding the recurrence of discussions about alternatives to Turkish membership such as the "privileged partnership" as advocated by Merkel's Germany and Sarkozy's France.
At a time when the euro zone economy has fallen into its deepest recession in more than three decades and the ranks of unemployed look set to swell by 2.5 million or more over the course of the next year, Turkey's troubled accession will certainly not rank as a matter of priority for Brussels. Accordingly, it is advisable that Ankara pays less attention and spends less energy to the accession process. All resources and energies will be needed to focus on Turkey's long-term vision for carving out a strong new position in the rapidly evolving global economic and geopolitical order.
Russia as an energy superpower
In this context, Turkey's growing ties with Russia in security, trade, construction and energy will have implications for both the EU and NATO as well as for regional energy supply corridors including the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline and the Nabucco gas pipeline to Austria.
Russia's weaknesses -- demographic decline, cronyism in the economy and a seething sense of national humiliation -- are well known, but Western vulnerabilities are no less real. Let there be no mistake: Russia is, in some respects, a dangerous state. With their background in the security services, its leaders are ruthless pragmatists who will use any means to achieve their objectives. Their goal may be to roll back Western influence in Russia's neighboring countries, but their strategy is to take whatever they can. Perceiving the West to be in decline, they are testing whether it has any coherent strategy to protect its interests. From what we have heard from Western leaders, it does not.
Russia's recent conflict with Georgia (putting aside who was right and wrong in instigating the Moscow action in retaliation to Washington's recognition of independence for Kosovo, wrested from Serbia militarily without a UN resolution) has completely changed the temperature across its western and southern flanks. While the Vladimir Putin-Dmitry Medvedev duo has stopped short of total occupation, they have lost no time insisting that Russia has "regions of privileged interest," a vivid reminder of its old imperial days under the Tsars.
Its former satellite nations, some in NATO, some in the EU and some up in the air, live now in fear of the Russian bear once again. The US and the EU responded less fiercely than what might have been warranted to the Russian military intervention.
The problem for Brussels (and to a lesser degree for Washington) is that some of the EU's largest members, such as Germany, France and Italy, along with Austria, Slovakia, Hungary and Bulgaria -- all countries heavily dependent on Russian energy supplies -- have called for dialogue with Russia, rather than sanctions or a halt in proposed partnership talks between the EU and Russia. The logic they use is "either we re-launch the Cold War or we choose the option of dialogue," as expressed by French Prime Minister Francoise Fillon.
The EU in terms of population is three-and-a-half times as big. Its economy is 15 times that of Russia. Its defense spending is 10 times higher. True, the EU is dependent on Russia for gas and oil imports but Russia is equally dependent on the EU for its energy markets. Gazprom's biggest and highest purchasing customer is the EU, followed by Turkey. Asia represents only 4 percent of its exports and existing infrastructure does not allow Russia to diversify much of its exports.
Turkey's own oil and gas reserves account for only a tiny fraction of its rapidly rising demand. So as global oil prices have risen, Turkey's bill for energy imports has spiraled, to more than $35 billion in 2008. While Turkey gets oil from a variety of sources, 60 percent of its gas needs are met by just one supplier: Gazprom. So while Turkey is keen to maintain good relations with Russia, it is also exploring ways of lessening its dependence on Gazprom.
Scant rainfall in recent years has forced power stations to rely more on gas rather than hydropower, of which Turkey usually has plenty. At the moment, Turkey is not short of gas. On the contrary, the long-term contracts that it has signed with Russia, Iran and other suppliers commit it to buying more than it actually needs. This leaves it potentially liable to pay penalties if it breaches these contracts. So Turkey needs to build infrastructure to store gas, to re-export surpluses to the EU and, most importantly, to distribute the gas around the country so that factories and households can use it.
Theirs is no question that Turkey is making the most of its geographical situation between producer and consumer countries. At the same time, it is protecting its own energy needs by becoming a transit and terminal country for oil and gas. But in the volatile world of energy, geopolitics sometimes trumps practicality in determining winners and losers.
Let's also not forget that Turkey's ability to establish itself as an energy transportation hub will depend on an array of intergovernmental, business and territorial agreements. With Russia trying to broaden its influence, the pace at which Turkey can, with US help, expand the BTC east-west corridor in a balancing act with the advancement of a north-south corridor will ultimately determine Turkey's future as an energy transport hub.
What's more, while Turkey profits from the east-west corridor by buying oil and gas from the East and selling it on to the West, Russia envisions retaining the profits of the north-south corridor, offering Turkey only transit fees. Russia aspires to achieve a predominant role -- it can be a major supplier of energy which is just shipped through Turkey.
The Nabucco gas pipeline is an ambitious project that seeks to diminish Europe's dependence on Russian gas. The 3,300-kilometer pipeline would ideally transport Azeri, Kazakh, Turkmen and Iranian gas to Romania, Hungary and Austria if it resolves the problem of synchronization along the chain. European support for Nabucco increased in the months following the Russia-Ukraine gas dispute and the Russian military showdown in Georgia.
Notwithstanding Nabucco's popularity, the project faces both political and economic obstacles. Nabucco presents just one option for Iran to use its gas. Iran has signed agreements to explore multibillion-dollar deals to export liquefied natural gas (LNG) to both China and India. Re-injecting gas into oil fields as a way to increase output is another option. Even if Iran opts for Nabucco, Iran's recent behavior -- indicating it might use gas as a tool of diplomacy, much like Russia -- is another impediment to the project.
Nabucco's future is further clouded by the war in Georgia, where among other objectives, Russia clearly demonstrated that any pipelines through the country are subject to its whim and mercy. This show of force could force many supplier and buyer countries to kowtow to Russian demands, but in the longer term it simply raises fears that Gazprom's increasing chokehold on Europe will be used to extract diplomatic concessions in a future conflict. In the longer term, Russia's hostility to Georgia has increased the political value of Nabucco. Nabucco is such a solid idea that it will eventually happen.
Russia is also courting the Arab world in a non-threatening way. The parade of leaders from Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to Palestine's Mahmoud Abbas with Russian leaders, as well as Putin's visits to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan last year, has sent a signal that Russia now intends to take a lead in the Arab world.
Georgia and Ukraine's NATO membership has split the allies, notably with the US and Germany quarrelling over just how much distance to keep from Georgia and Ukraine. Washington wants NATO to send a clear message that Moscow cannot intimidate the alliance and that it does not get to veto NATO membership.
*Mehmet Öğütçü is a former Turkish diplomat and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) executive. ogutcudunya@yahoo.co.uk
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