APPENDIX 2
Memorandum from Dr Andrew Mango
UNITED KINGDOM'S RELATIONS WITH TURKEY
Andrew Mango was born in Istanbul in 1926. For
fourteen years he was in charge of BBC broadcasts in Turkish.
After retiring from the BBC in 1986 as Head of South European
and French Language Services, he became a full-time writer and
consultant on Turkish affairs. He has written four books on Turkey,
the two most recent being Turkey: The Challenge of a New Role
(Praeger 1994) and Atatürk, a biography of the founder
of the Turkish Republic (John Murray 1999). He visits Turkey frequently.
1. Relations between the UK and Turkey are
extensive. The two countries are allies in NATO and fellow-members
of the Council of Europe and OECD. Commercial and personal relations
are robust. In the first nine months of 2001, Anglo-Turkish trade
totalled nearly US $3 billion, the UK being Turkey's 3rd best
customer (receiving $1.6 billion of Turkish exports) and the 7th
largest supplier of imports to Turkey ($1.3 billion of British
exports). In the first eleven months of 2001, over 834,000 British
residents visited Turkey. There is a considerable Turkish presence
in the City of London, which serves as a base for many international
investment funds operating in Turkey. British financial services
are active in Turkey, where HSBC has recently acquired a Turkish
bank. Although they are irked by visa restrictions, thousands
of Turks come to the UK to visit, shop, study or receive health
care. This extensive relationship has grown organically and owes
little to government initiatives.
2. Turkey is the largest and most populous
candidate for full membership of the EU. Its population was 68
million at the end of the year 2000, increasing (between 1990
and 2000) at 1.8 per cent a year, and with a median age of only
26 years (in 1990). Its GNP amounted to $200 billion in 2000,
when it was the 17th largest economy in the world. A steep devaluation
has since reduced nominal GNP to $140 billion, but in terms of
purchasing power of the local currency, the real reduction last
year amounted to some 8 per cent. The World Bank expects growth
this year to exceed 4 per cent, as the country emerges from its
debt crisis.
3. There is a strong potential for growth
in the export of British goods and services to Turkey and in British
investment in Turkish infrastructure. In this context it is unfortunate
that HMG allowed British participation in the Ilisu dam project
in eastern Turkey to be stopped by a disparate coalition of pressure
groups (environmentalists, Kurdish and Arab nationalists, etc.)
The coming years will see increasing foreign participation in
major public works in Turkey. British firms could and should strive
for a proper share of the work.
4. The alliance with the US is the anchor
of Turkish foreign policy. In return, the US Treasury encouraged
the IMF and the WB to extend to Turkey credits of some $19 billion
under the revised IMF stabilisation programme, which is expected
to provide another $10 billion this year. The US Administration
helped persuade the EU to recognise Turkey as a candidate for
full membership at the Helsinki Council in December 1999. It has
also backed pipeline projects to ship oil and gas from the Caspian
basin to Turkey (and through Turkey to the West). BP is the leading
partner in one such important project.
5. The British government has been supportive
of Turkey's European ambitions, which, public opinion surveys
show, are shared by some 70 per cent of the Turkish electorate.
But recently the British role has been less important than that
of Germany (Turkey's main trading partner and host to some two
million Turkish immigrants). France (a major investor) and Italy
(an Italian firm is building the Blue Stream pipeline under the
Black Sea to bring Russian gas to Turkey) are also displaying
considerable interest in Turkey. Although the Turkish Prime Minister,
Blent Ecevit, and the economic supremo, Kemal Dervis, have both
studied in Britain, the UK is as infrequent a destination for
Turkish ministers as Turkey is for their British counterparts.
6. As far as Turkey's application for full
membership of the EU is concerned, the UK need not question the
requirement that Turkey, like all other candidates, should meet
the "Copenhagen criteria" (relating to democratic institutions,
human rights, a properly functioning free market, etc.) It should
be appreciated, however, that Turkey's delay in meeting the criteria
is not due solely to a lack of political will. Turkey's rulers
have to be cautious in order to safeguard stability and law and
order, and also in order to keep the support of a freely elected
parliament. It is not easy to accommodate political Islam and
Kurdish nationalism within the structure of a democratic and secular
Turkish republic. While this delicate process goes on, the armed
forces are seen by the majority of Turks as guarantors of law
and order within a secular and unitary state. It is up to the
Turkish parliament and the government it supports to determine
the pace and scope of reforms needed to meet the "Copenhagen
criteria". What is important is not the date of Turkey's
EU membership but the continuation of the process of convergence
between the two. British-based NGOs have a perfect right to criticise
what they see as Turkey's democratic shortcomings. But HMG should
show that it understands Turkey's concerns, even where it does
not share them. It should, in any case, desist from unsolicited
advice.
7. The problem, now resolved as far as Turkey
is concerned, of gaining Turkey's approval for a structured access
to NATO facilities by ESDP is a case in point. Here Britain and
the USA have played a helpful role in working out a compromise
which satisfied Turkey's security concerns. But these concerns
could have been understood more quickly.
8. Such an understanding is lacking in the
Cyprus problem, where HMG is pushing for a settlement which, in
all likelihood, will make matters worse on the island and in relations
between Greece and Turkey. At a time when the West is as yet unable
to reunify the city of Mostar in Bosnia-Herzegovina, and bearing
in mind that more than fifty years after the expulsion of ethnic
Germans from Poland and the Czech republic, the possibility of
their return is still worrying these two EU candidate countries,
haste in reunifying Cyprus is foolhardy. True, most Turkish Cypriots
want to become EU citizens and many are in favour of reunification
for fear of being excluded from the EU. But their attitude will
change the moment Greek Cypriots use EU membership in order to
return to the north of the island and begin to press suits for
the return of their property. Yet this is precisely why the (Greek)
Republic of Cyprus is seeking EU membership. Whatever transitional
arrangements are agreed (and these will, in any case, be open
to challenge in European courts), there will be trouble between
the two communities if, at the very least, there is no preliminary
agreement on property claims, rights of residence and the movement
of persons. Trouble on the island will in turn poison relations
between Greece and Turkey and Turkey and the EU generally.
9. I am myself convinced by the arguments
put forward by Professor M.H.Mendelson Q.C. to show that the application
for EU membership by the Republic of Cyprus is illegal under the
1960 Constitution and Treaty of Guarantee. It is a crucial principle
of the 1960 settlement that Greece and Turkey should have an equal
status in Cyprus. This parity of status will become impossible
if the Republic of Cyprus precedes Turkey in EU membership. Transitional
arrangements to ensure parity would be difficult to devise and,
once again, open to challenge in EU law. By entertaining the application
of the (Greek) Republic of Cyprus, the EU has made it more difficult
to reach a settlement in Cyprus.
10. The US is supporting efforts to achieve
a Cyprus settlement and is in favour of Cypriot membership of
the EU. Yet the similarity between British and American approaches
is likely to be eroded the moment the admission of Cyprus is seen
to endanger the prospect of Turkish membership of the EU, a major
US policy aim. The insistence of the Turkish military on retaining
a strong presence in northern Cyprus is also likely to be met
with understanding in Washington
11. Turkish membership of the EU in the
fullness of time should also be a major objective of British policy
to which the search for a Cyprus settlement should be subordinated.
British political, strategic and commercial interests would be
well served by a strong and prosperous Turkey within the EU. If
the (Greek) Republic of Cyprus became a member before Turkey,
it would be able to obstruct Turkey's admission and any move favouring
Turkish interests. On the other hand, Turkey's membership would
facilitate a settlement in Cyprus. The present British policy
on Cyprus is putting the cart before the horse. The agreement
to hold direct negotiations between Messrs Glafcos Clerides and
Rauf Denktash, the leaders of Greek and Turkish Cypriots respectively,
should not inspire unrealistic hopes of winning over either Denktash
or Turkey to a settlement that would place Turkey at a disadvantage
in Cyprus
12. Stricter measures against organisations
and individuals deemed to be terrorist, introduced after September
11, have given the impression that British authorities had earlier
been hypocritical when they failed to take the action asked of
them by Turkish authorities against the presence in Britain of
the militant Kurdish nationalist PKK, the Marxist-Leninist DHKP/C,
etc. The argument is often heard in Turkey that Britain and other
Western countries allowed these organisations to operate on their
soil because they did not want Turkey to be strong, and that they
turned against them only when their own security was threatened.
The frequency with which these arguments are heard does not indicate
that political Islam is gaining ground in Turkey. The danger lies
elsewhere: in the growth of a truculent nationalism threatening
the partnership between Turkey and the West. The US administration
is taking great care to counteract this dangerous trend by emphasising
that it regards Turkey as a strategic and economic partner. HMG
should do likewise.
Andrew Mango
January 2002
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