[longtermmemmory]

from international herald tribune excerpt:" of accepting a poor, agrarian country into the bloc has been met with deep resistance across the EU. Recent polls show a majority of French, German and Austrian voters oppose admitting Turkey, and a majority of Danes would rather see non-EU candidate, Ukraine, in the EU than an "Islamic country" like Turkey.

That skepticism is likely to intensify in coming years, because leaders viscerally opposed to Turkey's entry are on the rise in two of the EU's most important countries, Germany and France. The Christian Democrat leader, Angela Merkel, who may lead a German coalition government after finishing ahead of the party in power in this month's elections, favors a "privileged partnership" for Turkey. In France, a likely presidential candidate, Nicolas Sarkozy, also opposes Turkish membership."

[Kolokotronis]

I must say I don't completely understand why the Greek government seems so hellbent to get Turkey into the EU. The best explanation I could get last spring when I was down there was that Greece already controlled through ownership positions much of the private Turkish infrastructure in a number of key areas and that EU membership would advance that ownership and, obviously, increase its value. Could be true for all I know, but it seems a very dangerous game to me.