by George Salamouras

In a recent article in Athens News English Edition 18/5/07 columnist Mark Dragoumis under the title "Sarkozy is wrong: Turkey deserves EU membership" was full of optimistic praise for our Eastern neighbour. According to Mr Dragoumis Turkey should not be left out of the EU. Turkey has been a member of the Council of Europe and an associate member of the EC/EU for nearly half a century. In fact, there is no European network of importance, from the Champions' League to the Eurovision song contest, of which Turkey is not a part. What about Israel? She also participates in the Champions league and the Eurovision song contest but I do not see her knocking down the EU door wanting EU membership?

Mr Dragoumis goes on praising Turkey saying that in four years, the Erdogan government has - under Brussels' supervision - streamlined the economy achieving steady annual growth of 5 percent or more and made more progress towards consolidating human rights than had ever been made in Turkey during her 80 years of "secular" governance. Does it then make sense to say that no matter how "European" the Turks become they will have never any chance of joining the EU?

My response to that is, what about political torture and racism towards 20% of its population which are Kurdish? What about recognising the Republic of Cyprus? What about admitting guilt for the Armenian and Pontian genocides which cost the lives of well over 2 million Christians? If Turkey was such a good responsible neighbour why do they not pull their 40.000 troops out of Cyprus and stop their flight encroachments on Greek Airspace? Turkey wants to join the EU on their own terms, how does that work?

The current Greek political elite of the two major parties are in the very small minority concerning Turkey's EU membership. The theory that somehow Turkey can change for the better if it is part of the EU is merely a pipe dream. Instead of taking Turkey to task concerning EU membership you are full of optimistic praise. The vast majority of Greek people know better that Turkey does not want to change or to put it simply cannot change as there is a battle going on right now in the hearts and minds of every Turk between the Military and Islam.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has tapped into what most European citizens think about Turkey and that is most do not want her in. If you look at recent surveys conducted in most EU member countries, the vast majority of people do not want Turkey in. As former French president Valery Giscard d'Estaing has said: "Turkey cannot be a member of the European political system. Why? It will be most numerous country in years to come, the poorest and most EU funds will go to Turkey at the expense of EU taxpayers and 95 percent of its territory is outside Europe".

There is another underlining reason for rejecting Turkey and that is the fear by many EU citizens of Islam for not properly integrating into mainstream EU societies and there are many examples of this in Germany, where the Turks are the largest minority there. If Turkey is ever admitted into the EU, millions of poor Turks will stream across Europe as EU citizens in search of better opportunities and forever change the demographics of many countries. For example, there are over 100,000 turkish-speaking Muslims in Thrace. If Turkey was admitted into the EU that figure could triple, thus changing Greece's demographics and putting Greece on high alert concerning its security.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel is right when she says that a privileged partnership should be formed with Turkey, but not full membership. The argument by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan that Europe should not be a Christian club needs to be re-examined. Turkey is a member of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), which binds together all Muslim countries in the world. There are no Christian countries there that have a large Muslim population such as France and Russia and perhaps Mr Erdogan needs being reminded of this. Admitting Turkey into the EU would be like admitting Mexico into the United States and the EU needs to remind the US to stay out of Turkey's corner.

In his conclusion Mr Dragoumis says Sarkozy and the Greek admirers of his views on Turkey had better start their own learning curve, perhaps keeping in mind what Christ said about how one should behave towards one's neighbour. My response to that comment is what does Allah and the Koran say about good neighbourliness?