EU keeps close watch on Turkish 'plot'

PARIS - The European Union is monitoring a struggle between Turkey's Islamist government and hardline secularists, discreetly warning that it expects the country to stand by the rule of law and transparency, set down as yardsticks for joining the EU.

The EU executive commission said it was following very closely allegations that dozens of officers in the armed forces - which considers itself the guardian of secularism established in 1923 by Kemal Ataturk - had plotted to overthrow the Government.

"Turkish citizens are entitled to hear the entire truth on these cases," Angela Filote, a spokeswoman for Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Fule, said in Brussels as the crackdown against the suspected plotters widened.

"That's why the investigation must be exemplary and carried out in full respect of the principles and standards of a fair judicial process."

Police have rounded up about 50 people, including the former chiefs of the Navy and Air Force, 17 retired generals and four active-duty admirals, over an alleged plot called Operation Sledgehammer.

According to a liberal Turkish paper, Taraf, which broke the story last month, the scheme was hatched in 2003.

It entailed bombing mosques and inciting Greece, Turkey's neighbour and longtime rival, into downing a Turkish jet to discredit the fledgling government and trigger its downfall, according to Taraf.

The investigation has brought to a boil the tensions that have simmered between the military, which has ousted four governments in the past 50 years, and the Justice and Development Party (AKP), the offshoot of a now-banned Islamist movement, which came to power after elections in 2002.

Secularists say the arrests aim at smearing the armed forces under an AKP strategy to install a one-party Islamic state. The operation, they note, comes on the heels of arrests of journalists and academics known to be critics of the Government.

Supporters of the AKP say "Operation Sledgehammer" provides further evidence of military meddling in politics. In 1997, the Army forced out Islamist Premier Necmettin Erbakan, the political patron of the current Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and in 2008 the AKP came close to being outlawed for breaching the secular constitution.

"The confrontation needs to be, and is, taken seriously by officials in Brussels and I would say also in Washington," said Fadi Hakura, an associate fellow at the Chatham House think-tank in London.

"One of the key criteria for EU membership is consolidation of civilian rule in Turkey."

Resistance to Turkish membership of the EU is rooted in several concerns.

One is the country's chronic periods of instability and military rule and abuse of human rights in the campaigns against Kurdish separatists.

There is also Ankara's support for the breakaway Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, set up after a Turkish invasion in 1974 that crushed an attempt to united the island with Greece.

But perhaps the biggest anxiety, usually never voiced, is about the impact of admitting a poor nation of 73 million people, the vast majority of whom are Muslims.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy has openly declared he is against Turkish membership and there is widespread opposition in Germany, which would be overtaken by Turkey as the EU's most populous country by 2020 on current demographic trends.

Seeking to reassure the EU, the Government pushed through laws in 2003 that eased restrictions on freedom of speech and use of Kurdish language and scrapped military involvement in a panel which had overseen the country's foreign and domestic policy.

The following year, it approved laws that toughened penalties against torture and violence against women and dropped a controversial proposal to make adultery a criminal offence.

The European Commission, meanwhile, has set down 35 "chapters" where it wants to see guarantees that Turkey has met European norms before it can give its green light to Turkey's accession. They include freedom of the judiciary and the media and rule of law as well as humdrum issues such as taxation, market competition and energy policies.

But the talks are moving at glacial pace. Only one "chapter" - on science and research - has been settled since membership negotiations began in 2005, and Turkey's frustration is growing, says Hakura.

"The weakness of the accession process means that the influence of the European Union is greatly diminishing in Turkey, even in such sensitive events as today," he believes.

"The EU is not now a major player in the current events unfolding in Turkey. This is primarily an internal Turkish matter and will needed to be handled within constitutional restraints and legal procedures. Public opinion may be the most crucial factor of all."

Other voices say Turkey's frail democracy should be helped by swiftly ushering it into Europe.

"Whatever the truth behind the accusations of a coup, the West should do its utmost to ensure our friend and ally remains a stable, democratic and prosperous nation," said Britain's Daily Telegraph. "The best way to do that is to push forward with the accession talks."