EU to hold talks on Turkey’s membership bid

Turkey first applied to join the bloc nearly four decades ago

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Cyprus could be a sticking point in his country's bid to join the EU. AP

The EU’s 27 foreign ministers are expected to hold an “open and serious discussion” on Thursday on Turkey’s long-standing membership bid at a meeting in Brussels, a senior official has said.

“It’s the moment to discuss one of the most important relationships with the EU, one of our biggest neighbours and a candidate to the union,” the official said of Turkey.

The foreign ministers are likely to signal a willingness to engage further with Turkey on key issues such as migration and finding a solution to diplomatic tensions over Cyprus but there is little expectation that Turkey will join the EU any time soon.

Turkey first applied to join the EU in 1987. Accession negotiations started in 2005 but came to a standstill in 2018 with the bloc concerned over Turkish democracy and rule of law. Tension between Turkey and EU-member Cyprus have further complicated Ankara’s ties with Brussels.

But relations have warmed since Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was re-elected in late May. Last week, Turkey approved Sweden’s accession bid to Nato after more than a year of stalling.

European Council President Charles Michel said after a meeting with Mr Erdogan that he wanted to “re-energise” relations.

Mr Michel asked the bloc’s foreign and security policy chief Josep Borrell for a report “with a view to proceed in a strategic and forward-looking manner”.

Mr Borrell, who met Turkey’s new Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan for the first time at a summit in Indonesia last week, is expected to submit his report to the council in October.

The senior EU official said Brussels welcomed recent economic decisions and “new appointments” made by Ankara.

Turkey is suffering a deep economic crisis with inflation close to 40 per cent. Its recently appointed central bank governor Hafize Gaye Erkan last month raised interest rates in a reversal of previous unorthodox policies.

Mr Borrell is expected to consult European foreign ministers before he starts his report.

But the EU official warned that Brussels and Ankara disagree on a number of issues that cannot be easily resolved.

“We have a number of issues on which we do not see eye-to-eye with Ankara,” said the official. “Now, we can see a certain change in approach in the new Turkish government. We want to test where we can go [with] that.”

Cyprus, the divided island

Members of the EU Parliament have also publicly expressed doubts that Turkey can join the EU before introducing deep rule-of-law reforms.

One of the main points of contention between the EU and Turkey is Cyprus. In its latest report on Turkey, the EU Commission in October highlighted Turkish threats to the island's sovereignty.

It also criticised Turkey’s “unilateral foreign policy” on Syria and Iraq, as well as Ankara’s “lack of alignment” with EU sanctions imposed on Russia.

The EU wants Turkey to back the UN’s efforts to reunite the island of Cyprus. The island has been divided since 1974 into a Turkish-controlled area in the north and the Republic of Cyprus, which became an EU member in 2004.

EU foreign ministers will also hold a 90-minute discussion with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken by video link.

They are scheduled to discuss major conflicts such as the war in Ukraine and also Russia’s decision to pull out of a Turkey-UN brokered deal that allowed Ukrainian grain to transit through the Black Sea.

Russia’s decision “is putting in danger the food security of hundreds of millions of people”, the senior EU official said.

“We are extremely concerned about that.”

The EU is not directly involved in negotiations between Russia, the UN and Turkey which brokered the deal in July last year.

Mr Erdogan has said he believes Russian President Vladimir Putin wants the deal to continue. Mr Fidan and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov spoke on Monday. Russia wants a smoother path for its own exports of food and fertiliser.

The collapse of the deal was followed by attacks on the Odesa region of Ukraine, which lies on the Black Sea. Ukraine says its grain export infrastructure was damaged but has vowed it will not be intimidated and is setting up a temporary shipping route to Romania.

Russia on Tuesday said it had hit military targets in two Ukrainian port cities overnight as "a mass revenge strike" for a blast that damaged a bridge to Crimea, which it seized from Ukraine in 2014.

Ukraine’s Agriculture Ministry said 60,000 tonnes of grain had been destroyed at Chornomorsk port, south-west of Odesa.

Russia and Ukraine are among the world’s top grain exporters.