Posted on 04/26/2017 8:42:11 AM PDT by Texas Fossil
Turkey will close the door on joining the European Union if it adopts constitutional changes backed at a referendum last week, a leading member of the EU parliament responsible for dealings with Ankara said on Wednesday.
Kati Piri’s comments come a day after President Tayyip Erdogan told Reuters Turkey will not wait at Europe’s door forever and could walk away from EU accession talks if rising Islamophobia and hostility from some member states persist.
The Dutch centre-left lawmaker, who is “rapporteur” on Turkey, told reporters ahead of a plenary debate on relations with Turkey that if Erdogan pushed through all the changes, which enhance his own powers, then the EU should formally suspend long-stalled talks on membership.
“As Turkey with such a constitution cannot become an EU member, it also doesn’t make sense to continue discussions on accession,” said Piri, echoing a number of other leading figures in the legislature, which last year passed a non-binding resolution calling for a suspension of the process.
On Monday, the EU executive’s commissioner responsible for membership applications, Johannes Hahn, called on EU foreign ministers to consider ending Turkey‘s accession process when they meet in Malta on Friday.
Like Hahn, Piri suggested that Brussels could step up talks on enhancing the customs union which Turkey already has with the EU over the next two to three years. She said that process could also give Europeans leverage to persuade Turkey to reverse policies which EU leaders say are undermining Turkish democracy.
They realized his new super powers gained by recent (stolen) Referendum preclude EU membership.
Actually this is a blessing for the EU. And their chance of survival.
Blessing or not - the Turks have had about enough of the EU’s incessent demands that lead no where. The EU has made so many promises to Turkey over the years and all they get in return is “your almost there” / more demands.
Regardless of the relgious / political situation - no people will put up with that forever.
IMHO both are better off without the other.
I agree.
But Erdogan the Islamist’s Turkey really sucks. It is now a dictatorship. And what you said about EU membership? Applies equally well to NATO under the current leadership.
The EU can’t have a member nation as a dictatorship because that’d be competition for the dictatorship of the bureaucracy in Brussels.
LOL!! EU—LOL!! Turkey won’t have anything to join...unless they’re the only member.
Bingo! We have a Winner!
BUMP
Turkey can’t be a member of NATO either, since it is run by the very religion that we are spending trillions of dollars to supposedly defeat. Most NATO members have equipment or troops fighting an apparently unnamed enemy, i.e., ISIS, AlQad, or what name they are operating under today.
How about Turkish acknowledgement that what their ancestors did to the Armenians was genocide as a precondition for membership?
And how about Turkey removing its occupation forces from Cyprus, for that matter? Never understood why Turkey was even remotely considered for EU membership given its illegal military occupation of Cyprus. Should’ve been a no-go from day zero.
Not going to happen. ever.
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