From: kutluk@ccl.umist.ac.uk (Kutluk Ozguven)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.turkish,soc.culture.jewish,soc.culture.greek,soc.culture.europe
Subject: Re: how european do the turks feel
Date: 11 Sep 92 09:33:36 GMT
Organization: Manchester Computing Centre

In <9209082000.AA10307@kocrsw06.delcoelect.com> c23st@kocrsv01.DElcoelect.COM (Spiros Triantafyllopoulos) writes:

>Deniz Akkus writes:
>> Are you asking whether Turkey has a legal right to try to enter the
>> EEC if it wants to?  I believe it does.  However your question seems
>> to be slanted on the side of 'does it belong there?'.  As such
>> questions often involve words such as 'civilized' I am tired of
>> answering.  I am sure our Greek friends will fill you in with their
>> opinions on the matter.

>What an interesting statement. I wonder if villages in, say, Sicily,
>Spain, or Greece, are any more or less 'civilized' than the ones in 
>Anatolia. (don't have a list of provinces handy, sorry).

>Entrance to the EC is simply money. What XXX has to give and what XXX
>has to offer in return... In Turkiye's case, the obvious "to give" 
>feature is lots of cheap labor. I chuckle every time you (or anyone
>else) mentions Greece as the only stumbling block in Turkiye's 
>entry in the EC... Witness what is happening in Germany (attacks
>against guest workers and refugees). Greece's just a convenient
>excuse that other governments can use to deny entrance to Turkiye. 

>(thanks for reminding everyone just "how bad dem greeks are")

>As for the remarks that Turkiye is a member of, say, European sports or
>broadcasting organizations, well, Israel is a member of sports
>associations (great basketball folks!), broadcasting (Eurovision song
>festival, argh) , and other associations in Europe. I have not seeing
>them proclaiming their "European-ness" anytime lately...

Turkey has just been the term president of the Council of Europe.
This is the political organization of the whole Europe since the cold
war. Turkey is in the other Europen political organization, CSCE, and
it is a Turkish diplomat  who runs the vice presidency. Turkey is
NATO, and undoubtedly part of the security organization of Europe,
or the West if you like. Turkey is in all European sportive, cultural,
and scientific cooperation organizations. The only working European
organization Turkey is not a *full* member is EC. It has been an
associate member since 1964 to EEC.

There is no discusion that Turkey is a part of Europe from a
diplomatic or international law point of view. There is no argument 
on whether Turkey is in or out of Europe even for the hardline
anti-Turks in the Commission. 

The problem is religion, as the president of Turkey or many European
politicians previously raised. Europe, for the EC seniors, is not
stable enough a system to cope with a different voice. 

And in that respect we know that they are right on the fragile
structure and weak ties and the lack of a clear objective in the
European union. What is the common ground between a German neonazi and
a French peasant, a Danish gayrights activist and an Irish
anti-abortion campaigner, a Greek patriot and an English patriot,
let alone the "alien" minorities. Now that the concept of how to
worship God is out of fashion in this continent, the only common ground is
economical, i.e. to rethrone the pre-WWI regime of Europe-as-the
receiver of wealth.

Kutluk

ps: My vote to a Maastricht referenadum would have been no, just as
the Danes or other donor countries.
Xref: sparky soc.culture.turkish:9959 talk.politics.mideast:20006 talk.politics.soviet:7910 soc.culture.greek:8858 soc.culture.europe:8361 soc.history:8259