Insight
Turkey and the EU: No end to the drift by Luigi Scazzieri 16 October 2017
Turkey’s slide away from the West encompasses both values and foreign policy. But if the EU ended the accession negotiations without an alternative in place, it would only worsen the problem. Relations between the EU and Turkey have been worsening since the mid-2010s, when the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan started to exhibit more authoritarian tendencies. The pace of deterioration of relations dramatically increased after the failed military coup in August 2016 and the ensuing crackdown, which resulted in the arrest of 40,000 people and the dismissal of 140,000 others. The next blow came with the passing of a controversial constitutional reform in April 2017. During the vote, the Turkish government lashed out at EU member-states that would not allow government ministers to campaign in Europe, especially the Netherlands and Germany. In one outburst, Erdoğan accused Berlin of ‘Nazi’ practices for blocking rallies in Germany ahead of the referendum. The constitutional reform, which passed only narrowly, moved Turkey further away from the standards of liberal democracy. Before the coup attempt and referendum the EU’s reaction to Turkey’s drift had been quite mild, mainly because Ankara was seen as a key partner in the management of migration flows during the refugee crisis. As part of a deal signed in March 2016 to return migrants arriving in Europe to Turkey, the EU promised to revive the accession negotiations and to grant Turks visa-free travel to the EU. Then, as it became clear that it was impossible to move forward even symbolically with those talks, the EU tried to focus on the promised modernisation of the EU-Turkey customs union. But these efforts were in vain. Erdoğan’s sustained crackdown following the coup attempt has continued to sour bilateral relations. In the summer of 2017, they took another turn for the worse after Turkish authorities arrested some German citizens. In response the German government warned its citizens travelling to Turkey that there was a risk of arbitrary detention, including in tourist areas. Chancellor Angela Merkel also said she wanted to freeze pre-accession financial assistance, suspend negotiations to deepen the customs union, and call off Turkey’s accession negotiations. This call came at the same CER INSIGHT: Turkey and the EU: no end to the drift 16 OCTOBER 2017
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