Verbatim report of proceedings

Wednesday, 27 September 2006 - Strasbourg

5.11. Turkey's progress towards accession (vote)

- On paragraphs 28 and 29:

  President. − The Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance proposes swapping the order of paragraphs 28 and 29 and combining them into a single paragraph.

Is anybody opposed?

(Parliament approved the change)

The Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance also proposes inserting paragraph 30 before paragraph 22.

Is anybody opposed?

  Camiel Eurlings (PPE-DE), rapporteur. – It does not make a big difference, but we prefer the original sequence, and therefore we oppose this shifting of paragraph 30.

(Parliament rejected the change)

  President.− The Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance also proposes inserting paragraph 33 before paragraph 31 and combining them into a single paragraph.

Is anybody opposed?

  Camiel Eurlings (PPE-DE), rapporteur. – Mr President, I do not want to hold up the vote any longer, but here too we prefer the original sequence because we think it is better.

(Parliament rejected the change)

- Before the vote on Amendment 51:

  Jan Marinus Wiersma (PSE). – Mr President, I have a simple oral amendment to correct the text. It suggests that a committee of experts should be set up by the Turkish Government to look into the issue of the genocide, ‘under the auspices of the United Nations’. This is our idea not their idea, so to make it clear that it is our proposal that this committee should also work under the auspices of the United Nations, we want to improve the text by replacing ‘under the auspices of the United Nations’ with ‘which should be under the auspices of the United Nations’. We are therefore adding the words ‘which should be’.

(Parliament accepted the oral amendment)

- On paragraph 72:

  Camiel Eurlings (PPE-DE), rapporteur. – (NL) Mr President, on behalf of the members of my delegation, I wanted, for clarity’s sake, to make a change to the voting list. Against the vote in sections about the original text of paragraph 72, a minus sign has been inserted in both the first and second parts by mistake. This should be changed into a plus sign in both instances, just so as to make matters absolutely clear. We will be voting by roll call for the first and second parts.

- Before the vote on Amendment 59:

  Camiel Eurlings (PPE-DE), rapporteur. – Mr President, I see that the oral amendments have been distributed. They merely update the text of this amendment, so I do not think we need to have much discussion on them.

(Parliament accepted the oral amendment)

- Before the vote on the motion for a resolution thus amended:

  Camiel Eurlings (PPE-DE), rapporteur. – (NL) Mr President, the vote on this report puts an end to a few months of exhaustive proceedings. With the vote, as this House has voted on the amendments, the text of the report is coming very close to the original text which I as rapporteur proposed to the Committee on Foreign Affairs. The report is strict, yet fair: fair because we in this House have expressed our seriousness and commitment, but fair also because we, in turn, demand from Turkey that it should show commitment, both in terms of the implementation of the Ankara Protocol before the end of this year and of carrying out political reforms in the area of the freedom of expression of opinion and freedom of religion by the end of 2007.

Nor let there be no mistake about the text with regard to the Armenian genocide. Although it is, strictly speaking, not a formal condition, we think it unavoidable for a country on the path to Europe to come to terms with its past. I therefore hope that Turkey will interpret this paragraph 50 as an extra incentive, together with its neighbour Armenia, to face up to the facts.

Mr President, I come to the conclusion that the report is fair but tough. The European Parliament is fulfilling its responsibility for safeguarding European values and the accession criteria with this report. I therefore ask all Members to support the report as broadly as possible. I hope that Turkey will see it as an incentive to speed up its reforms.

(Loud applause)

  President. That concludes the vote. We shall now proceed to the explanations of vote.