Austria Shows Red Light To Turkeys E.U. Bid

Austrian Prime Minister Wolfgang Schüssel showed red light to Turkey's hopes to open accession talks with European Union by end of 2004.

The Austrian Prime Minister told German 'Capital' journal that they oppose Turkey's EU membership due to religious reasons. "Turkey has a lot of conflicts stands before on her way to EU membership."

Turkey is only Muslim country with relatively poor country of 70 million people waiting to open accession talks since 1999 when the EU gave candidateship status.

EU leaders are due to meet in December to decide whether Turkey, a candidate country since 1999, has made enough progress on human rights and political freedoms for the initiation of the long-delayed accession talks with the EU.

London, Berlin, Rome and Madrid support Turkey's EU membership while Paris and Vienna are still skeptical.

Schüssel said that Turkey has three times higher number of farmers than farmers in all EU members. "Austria will not give green light to Turkey as long as the existing problems persist." The Austrian Prime Minister offered a privileged partnership status to Turkey instead of full membership.

Turkey is expecting to open entry talks with the European Union (EU) by the end of 2004, and has adopted a series of EU harmonization packages, including political and economic criteria, to meet membership requirements.

The European Union pledges to open accession talks with Turkey without delay if Turkey fulfills the Copenhagen political criteria, the final joint declaration of the Brussels EU leaders' summit stated in June.

Austrian President Heinz Fischer, who took office on July 8, had told Turkish Aksam daily in June that the EU was not ready to accept Turkey as a member and needs time to assimilate new comers from central and eastern Europe. (CHA/EK)