EGEMEN BAGIS EXPLAINS TURKEY’S EU ACCESSION PROCESS IN YALTA

Minister for European Union Affairs and Chief Negotiator Egemen Bagis represented Turkey in the 10th Annual Meeting of Yalta European Strategy (YES) held in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea which is attached to Ukraine.

More than 250 representatives of the worlds of politics, business, society and media from 20 countries attended the 10th Yalta Annual Meeting which was held in the historic Livadia Palace in Yalta under the title of “Changing Ukraine in a Changing World”.

Egemen Bagiş made a speech at the panel discussion entitled “Europe: Destination Unknown” and stated that the difficulties that Turkey experienced for being kept waiting since 1959 damaged Europe more than Turkey. Bagis said that Europe cut its own throat and unfortunately delayed the benefits to be derived from Turkey’s accession. Bagis indicated that Turkey would make contributions to the European Union rather than weakening it and that they wanted to join the EU in order not to be a burden to Europe but to lessen the burden of it.

Bagis expressed that the point of view towards Europe in Turkey had changed in the long run. Bagis said: “Democracy is the most important value of the EU. However it kept silent about the assault on democracy in Egypt and did not take an active role as an international actor in the debate on the events in Syria. Thus, credibility and reliability of the EU have decreased in the other regions of the world considerably.”

Egemen Bagis stated that Europe had prejudices against Turkey and continued: “Istanbul, the city that bridges Asia and Europe, couldn't get the Olympics because of those prejudices. We witness such prejudices in our EU accession process too.”

Egemen Bağış, within the framework of the Yalta Program, also met the President of the Crimean Tatar National Assembly, Mustafa Abdulcemil Kırımoglu.