Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/1999-12-14-Speech-2-077"
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"en.19991214.4.2-077"2
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"Mr President, Commissioner. I am most glad to see Commissioner Patten here today because we were in Turkey a few days ago as the official Parliament delegation. His interview in
caused a furore. Perhaps as the result less of what he said than of what
added. Since meeting him for the first time in Hong Kong, I have held Commissioner Patten in the highest regard on account of his open, unconventional approach. However, I feel that perhaps a few matters need to be cleared up.
Firstly, I am most grateful to the Commission for preparing the Summit, the outcome of which showed that it had made a clear statement and had not dodged the issue. Turkey is a candidate. As far as I am concerned, that means quite unequivocally that Turkey has to start behaving like a candidate; in other words, the necessary changes must be made. As Mr Oostlander said, Europe stops where human rights violations begin; at least, I know what he meant. I also trust that human rights are accepted outside Europe. But the reverse is of course true. A country can only belong to the Europe of the European Union if it accepts human rights. No other way forward is possible.
Our task is to prepare, support and help Turkey along this path. But we at least made clear in our discussions with all the party chairmen and other politicians in Turkey that Turkey has to do the work. These changes are in Turkey’s own interest. They want and hopefully they will be able to function better, more quickly and more comprehensively with Europe. But we cannot do the work for Turkey.
I believe that the Commission should now draw up specific annual programmes – I hope with maximum input from Parliament – containing indications as to how Turkey can set about this work and how we can help. Turkey must state clearly that it intends to abolish the death penalty next year or in two years’ time and that it intends to release its political prisoners over this period and deal with the Kurdish question during this period. The fact is that Turkey has only acknowledged in discussions over recent weeks and months that there even is a Kurdish question. How it intends to solve this problem, it does not yet know, that is not yet understood. But I believe that there has already been a great deal of progress.
The Helsinki Summit, at which Greece above all behaved in an exemplary manner and at which, in the end, Turkey too behaved in a reasonable manner, went very well on this question but the work is not yet finished. In fact it has only just begun. The best decision to come out of Helsinki is that we are now able to start work."@en1
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