Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour)

I thank the Taoiseach for his contribution and his report on the Council. It was not the sort of Council meeting to which we have become accustomed, being quite humdrum at one level. When one reads the conclusions, however, one becomes aware that many decisions were taken and much progress made. I wish to concentrate on some of the more prominent of those decisions.

The major issue to emerge is that of Turkey. There is a sense that, having made the decision to allow negotiations to commence on 3 October of this year, member states, including Ireland, have completed their task and that it is now the responsibility of Council officials and the Turks to complete the project and ensure that Turkey meets the standards set for it and other applicant countries. That would be a mistake and we cannot afford to be complacent.

The nub of the issue is whether Europe is a Christian or a pluralist project. At the back of this issue is the forthcoming constitutional referendum in countries such as the Netherlands and France, where notwithstanding the current level of public opinion poll support for the ratification of the constitutional treaty, there are undercurrents that attempt to suggest Turkey is not fully eligible for membership of the European Union by virtue of its being a modern Islamic state, albeit a secular one in terms of separation of church and state. However, even the form of separation of church and state in Turkey is unique. It is not the type of separation of church and state, for example, one would associate with the Republic of France.

I, therefore, urge the Government and the Council of Ministers to ensure that the debate on Turkey's eligibility is maintained at a positive level. Turkey is as much a European country as Russia, the difference being that Turkey, like Russia, had a contiguous empire that stretched all the way to Basra, in one direction, and as far as Morocco and Rabat, in the other, just as the Russian empire continues to stretch as far as Vladivostok, north of Japan. Other European empires tended not to be contiguous in their territorial composition and, therefore, the mother country, so to speak, could be separated from outlying imperial posts.

Turkey was described in the 19th century as the "sick man of Europe". It was recognised by the power centres of Europe at the time, whether London, Berlin or Paris, that Turkey was an integral part of the European culture and body politic. One cannot look at the civilisation and culture of Europe without seeing the role that Turkey has played. When one drinks a cup of coffee in Budapest, for example, one recognises that the Turks were there for about 150 years because it is not exactly coffee that one gets from Starbucks.

The suggestion that in some way the Turks are not European is erroneous. We can simply say that a decision has been taken to open the negotiations and that is the end of the matter. There are, however, a number of points I want to make as regards this matter. Other countries have come into the European Union with equally difficult civil rights backgrounds and deficiencies as regards their democratic deficits. I am not referring to central and eastern Europe. Greece, Spain and Portugal were dictatorships until the mid-1970s or early 1980s, and yet they qualified for membership and have progressed. There is nothing inherent in the Turkish composition that prevents them from achieving the same level of democratic accountability, including separation of powers and the independence of judiciary, that has been achieved in Spain, Portugal and Greece. We should bear that in mind. I urge the Taoiseach and the Minister for Foreign for Affairs to recognise that we cannot take this for granted. The debate and leadership of the debate must continue to be articulated. Otherwise the negativity associated with sectarianism, suspicion and fear of Islam because of what is happening elsewhere will confuse and confound it.

An outstanding item that is of particular relevance to Ireland in all this is the question of Cyprus and the extraordinary insult that the Prime Minister of Turkey gave, at the end of the proceedings, to that whole question. Ireland can relate in a particular manner to the Cyprus problem. The Cypriots must be strongly supported in their legitimate demand that the Ankara Government should at least recognise the existence and legality of the Cypriot state. While the analogy is less than perfect, it is possible for countries to have difficulties as regards territorial claims over adjoining areas while recognising them and co-operating at the same time.

The existence of Articles 2 and 3 in the early 1970s did not prevent Britain and Ireland from working closely together, even though it could be argued that territorial disputes were implicit in their legal status, which have happily been resolved, as the Taoiseach knows. As a smaller member state which has shared a similar history to that experienced by both Turkish and Greek Cypriot peoples, Ireland should be strong and steadfast in its support for the recognition of Cyprus, in a generous way, as a full member state, by the Ankara Government.

I want to turn to the Taoiseach's welcome announcement that he intends to proceed rapidly with the establishment of embassies in the five remaining candidate member states, including Bulgaria and Romania. I am not sure whether we have an embassy in Croatia, or whether that is next on the list.

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