I went to Turkey just before the European Council with fellow MEP Daniel Cohn-Bendit to see for ourselves how Turkey was approaching this critical EU decision. First, we found unanimous support for EU membership from all political forces in government and opposition, as well as from representatives of all ethnic groups and religions. Even the Islamic fundamentalist Virtue Party sees the more liberal climate that will be undoubtedly promoted by Turkey's candidature as a guarantee against its being outlawed by the current, autocratic but aggressively secular regime. Second, we found a political culture in stark contrast with that of Western Europe's liberal democracy. The Turkish republic founded by Kemal Attaturk in the 1920s was and is obsessed with national security and identity.
Citizenship exists to serve the sovereign and indivisible Turkish state.
The military have a central and privileged role to play in government. Turkey's parliamentary democracy is run by factional and weak political parties, for whom clients seem more important than ideas. Against this background, even with the assistance of the EU and IMF, the great commercial skills of the Turks will be tested severely. But the Helsinki summit was right to give Turkey the amber light for eventual Union membership. Turkey will only be able to modernise itself on the basis of the European traditions of pluralist democracy and social justice.