Yes, of course there are issues about Turkey and EU membership that we should be airing. However, we can’t get to the substance without first getting the facts mangled by Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando out of the way.
... there is a line of distinguished Europeans opposed to Turkey’s membership- Ranier Fsadni
Dr Pullicino Orlando has spoken as though the Maltese government has only just declared its favourable position (pending satisfaction of the Copenhagen criteria) on Turkey’s membership. In fact, Tonio Borg is no less than the third Foreign Minister to oversee this position. He inherited it from the John Dalli period. If Dr Borg needs a mandate, it is to change the current disposition.
It was first announced in Parliament in June 2004 – by the Prime Minister in response to questions from the opposition. It was reported in the press, as was the discussion two years later when Michael Frendo, by now Foreign Minister, again gave reasons for Malta’s position, with George Vella for the opposition going through the pros and cons (though he also criticised the lack of debate).
It’s not as though backbenchers were excluded from the discussion. The 2006 parliamentary report indicates that Michael Asciak (PN) spoke in favour of Turkey’s candidacy. Where was Dr Pullicino Orlando?
He isn’t paying a lot of attention now, either. He got wrong the European Popular Party’s position. He said the EPP, the European party to which the Nationalist Party belongs, is against. No, it’s not.
The EPP’s position is actually equivocal – technically in favour but in practice split. Some important delegations are against. Dr Pullicino Orlando is right about Germany and France. But the delegations in favour cannot be discounted.
On this issue, the EPP is bound to be split since the case of Turkey highlights certain ideological fissures within it. What counts as a disadvantage for some EPP members – that Turkey’s size and Muslim majority would make social union more difficult to achieve – is one of the advantages for others, who prefer a looser, market-based union.
Dr Pullicino Orlando mentioned the EPP to point out that being anti-Turkish membership isn’t crass or racist. No, not necessarily. But his reported reaction to the Turkish EU Affairs Minister’s bad tempered response to his opposition treads close to the line. To imply that one person’s not very bright answer is symptomatic of an entire people’s cultural identity – permanent and unchangeable – suggests one is saying one thing but doing another: speaking of “culture” while ticking the boxes of race.
That said, there is a line of distinguished Europeans opposed to Turkey’s membership. It includes Valery Giscard d’Estaing, the former French President who chaired the Convention on the Future of Europe, and Joseph Ratzinger, at least as cardinal.
And when Dr Pullicino Orlando spoke of Turkey being too big and too poor for membership, he was citing standard arguments – so familiar they were mentioned in Parliament back in 2006, although he didn’t then feel impelled to back them.
Yes, there is a case for wider discussion. While Parliament won’t have to vote to approve Turkey’s membership for a few years yet, the case raises issues concerning Malta’s specific interests that need safeguarding and pursuit from now.
Turkey’s size, in political terms, is more or less relevant depending on how power is distributed within the EU. It would arguably be against Malta’s interests to give more decision-making powers to the European Parliament, where population sizes matter greatly (even if Malta has disproportionately large representation in the EP as well). But we’re in that situation already.
Turkey’s case highlights the importance of Malta having a clear, durable understanding – consistent from one government to the next – of what kind of Europe it would like to see.
Or take the argument that Turkey is not part of Europe. That was not the view of one of Europe’s founders, Alcide de Gasperi, who was also convinced of the significance of Europe’s Christian heritage. In 1953, giving an important address in Rome, he warned against limiting “Europe” to strict geography. He included the North African coast and the Near East (clearly including Turkey) as European “elements”. He said that the Europe he wanted to build “excluded nothing”.
De Gasperi’s view is nowadays so neglected that it sounds strange. Except that the Maltese government’s position resembles it in some ways. Malta is possibly unique in favouring Turkey’s membership while insisting that Europe needs to do more to develop a meaningful European partnership, involving governance, with states that will not become members.
The pro-partnership rhetoric is usually made by people trying to find a way of keeping Turkey out. Pro-Turkey advocates tend to dismiss partnership as second-class membership, which, of course, poisons relations with southern Mediterranean states that are offered it.
The development of an equitable European partnership would help solve some of the serious difficulties of the current Mediterranean arrangements. The fact that Malta is pro-Turkey enables it to insist on the fleshing out of such a partnership for the Mediterranean region without being suspected of ulterior motives. It is a diplomatic advantage so much in the national interest that it is not to be given up lightly.
ranierfsadni@europe.com