By Jeyhun Aliyev
ANKARA (AA) – Turkey on Wednesday rejected the European Parliament's "unilateral and by no means objective" 2019-2020 report on Turkey, a resolution it passed earlier in the day.
Passing such a resolution at a time when efforts are being made to revive Turkish-EU relations on the basis of its EU membership perspective within the framework of a positive agenda "is unacceptable," said a Foreign Ministry statement.
"We reject this biased text which not only includes false allegations regarding human rights, democracy, the rule of law, our governmental system and political parties; and views Turkey's effective, solution-oriented, humanitarian and enterprising foreign policy as a threat; but also reflects the completely unfair and biased Greek and Greek Cypriot arguments regarding the Aegean, the Eastern Mediterranean and Cyprus issue and supports the one-sided and inconsistent Armenian narratives regarding the 1915 events," it said.
The ministry stressed that it considers that the wording of the report, as it tries to call Turkey's accession negotiations into question, to reflect "a lack of vision and an effort to deviate from the principle of pacta sunt servanda," meaning agreements must be kept.
"It is well known by the EU institutions and the EP members that the standstill in Turkey's accession negotiations is not due to Turkey’s lack of will for reforms or any shortcoming in assuming the EU acquis, but, rather, to the fact that certain circles have exploited the membership process as an opportunity for political gains against Turkey since the beginning of this process," it added.
The ministry also underlined that the EU membership is a strategic goal for Ankara and would benefit all of Europe and beyond, adding that Turkey will "decisively" continue its efforts in line with this objective.
"While the EU expresses its appreciation for our efforts, particularly with regard to migration issue, within the scope of the Turkey-EU Statement of 18 March 2016, for which we have fulfilled our commitments, the EU should get out of the vicious circle of not taking any concrete step to fulfil its own commitments in the 18 March Statement, ranging from Turkey’s EU accession process to cooperation on migration," it said.
It also highlighted that as a candidate country, Turkey expects the European Parliament to carry out "constructive efforts" about how relations can be improved with Ankara and how it can contribute to Turkey's EU integration process, rather than "being a platform for baseless allegations and blind accusations against Turkey."
An official candidate for bloc membership since 1999, Turkey’s EU accession talks began in 2005, but have stalled in recent years, a development Turkey blames on political moves by the Greek Cypriot administration and others.
