EU Turkey talks under threat

Turkey’s quest to join the EU could come to a halt this year according to an internal document seen by the FT.

The newspaper says concerns over Ankara’s human rights record and tensions with Cyprus could see accession talks founder in their early stages.

“The pace of change has slowed in the last year,” the report is quotes as saying in the FT.

“There is an urgent need to both implement legislation already in force and...to take further legislative initiatives.?Further efforts are needed to ensure full civilian control over the military, in line with practice in EU member states.”

The EU report is being prepared ahead of an EU-Turkey meeting scheduled for next week – when Brussels is due to open the first of 35 negotiating “chapters.”

But Ankara-Nicosia tensions threaten to bedevil every part of the talks.

Brussels has given Turkey an ultimatum to open its airports and harbours to Greek Cyprus this year.

EU enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn has said Turkey-EU relations are heading for a “train crash” over the issue.

Cyprus has been an EU member since 2004, but has no diplomatic relations with Turkey, which invaded the island in 1974.

Instead, Ankara maintains diplomatic ties with the Turkish Cypriot community in the north of the island.

The also draft seen by the FT also states that the pace of reform in Turkey has slowed down in the past year, adding that greater implementation of existing legislation is needed.

It expresses concern over the use of torture, "the cases pending against individual persons for non-violent expression of opinion."

Fears are also raised over difficulties experienced by non-Muslim religious minorities and over the increasing number of violent clashes in the mainly-Kurdish southeast.

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