Turkish Government Exposes David Cameron’s Spin on Turkey

This week, UK diplomats, in collusion with other senior EU figures, rubber-stamped a decision to open the next stage of negotiations for Turkey’s accession to the EU.

The EU’s migration commissioner has said that Turkey now has the ‘road open’ to ‘join the European family’.

Boris Johnson, Michael Gove, and Gisela Stuart have written to David Cameron, urging him to clarify the Government’s position. Does he still want to ‘pave the road from Ankara to Brussels’, or has he changed his mind? If he has, then he must pledge to veto Turkey’s membership of the EU, and block the imminent granting of visa-free travel to nearly 80 million Turkish citizens.

Commenting, Vote Leave Chief Executive Matthew Elliott said:

‘David Cameron’s furious insistence that Turkey’s accession is not an issue in this referendum is looking increasingly bizarre – only yesterday, a spokesman for the Turkish government dismissed his claims as rhetoric to reassure voters.

‘It’s very clear that accession negotiations are rapidly accelerating, and if Cameron refuses to guarantee he will veto their membership then the public will draw the reasonable conclusion that the only way to avoid having common borders with Syria and Iraq is to Vote Leave on 23 June.’

• The Turkish Government has today slammed as spin claims by David Cameron that Turkish accession is not on the cards.

• The European Commission yesterday announced that Turkish membership talks are being conducted ‘at an accelerated pace’.

• This confirmed a report that David Cameron has agreed to a quickening of accession talks, which could begin as early as the day after the referendum.

• David Cameron strongly supports Turkish accession at the earliest moment.

• Turkey is set to join the EU in the near future: we are paying them £1 billion to join.

The Turkish Government has today slammed as spin claims by David Cameron that Turkish accession is not on the cards.

A report in The Times this morning notes that: ‘Diplomats, including those from the UK, yesterday rubber-stamped a decision to open the next chapter of Turkey’s accession negotiations by the end of the month. Mr Cameron insists that Turkey’s accession is not an issue for the future as on its present rate of progress it would not be ready “until the year 3000”. A spokesman for the Turkish government dismissed that yesterday as rhetoric to reassure voters’.

The European Commissioner for Migration and Citizenship, Dimitris Avramopoulos, has said that Turkey now has the ‘road open’ to ‘join the European family’.

The European Commission yesterday announced that Turkish membership talks are being conducted ‘at an accelerated pace’.

In a press release, the European Commission has announced that ‘The Commission tabled the Draft Common Position on Chapter 33 (financial and budgetary provisions) in the Council on 29 April, enabling the Council to decide on the opening of this Chapter by end of June. In addition, preparatory work continues at an accelerated pace to make progress on five Chapters’.

The Commission issued a detailed statement on the rapidly accelerating progress of Turkish accession this morning. Part of this process will occur ‘at the end of June’, just after the public votes.

This confirmed a report that David Cameron has agreed to a quickening of accession talks, which could begin as early as the day after the referendum.

The Financial Times reported this week that: ‘Turkey’s EU membership talks are set to be given a boost within a fortnight, after Britain abandoned its attempt to freeze the process of opening a new “negotiating chapter” with Ankara until after its EU referendum… At a meeting of diplomats on Tuesday morning, Britain was the only member state to refuse to give its consent for talks to begin with Ankara on financial and budgetary issues, in spite of its traditional standing as one of the biggest champions of Turkish membership talks. However, London’s resistance only lasted a few hours, which means the formal opening of talks is expected on June 24 or 30, in line with the Turkey-EU deal’.

David Cameron strongly supports Turkish accession at the earliest moment.

David Cameron strongly supports Turkish accession. In 2010, Cameron said he was ‘angry’ at the slow pace of Turkish accession, that he was the ‘strongest possible advocate for EU membership’ for Turkey, and that ‘I want us to pave the road from Ankara to Brussels’. In 2014, he said that: ‘In terms of Turkish membership of the EU, I very much support that. That’s a longstanding position of British foreign policy which I support’.

The Government admitted it supported Turkish accession during the campaign. In April, the Europe Minister, David Lidington, said: ‘The UK supports Turkey’s EU accession process’.

The British public will not get a vote on the accession of Turkey to the EU. The European Union Act 2011 allows the Government to ratify EU accession treaties without a referendum. There was no referendum on the accession of Croatia to the EU in 2013.

The Government opposes giving the British people a say. As the Minister for Europe, David Lidington, said in 2011: ‘A few years ago, 10 new member states joined the European Union at the same time. I believe that their combined population then was 73 million, which is slightly greater than Turkey’s population is now. I do not believe that anybody in this country argued at that time that a British referendum on those accessions was right’.

Turkey is set to join the EU in the near future: we are paying them £1 billion to join.

Turkey is due to join the EU in the next few years, having already signed a deal with the EU to prepare for accession (European Commission, March 2016, link).

It is set to receive over £1 billion of UK funds to help prepare it for membership.

The new European Council building contains chairs and building space for Turkey when it joins.