"A MILITARY CONSTITUTION BRINGS MINIMUM DEMOCRACY"

Speaking at the meeting held at Kutahya Chamber of Commerce and Industry with the participation of businessmen and representatives of the non-governmental organizations, Egemen Bagis, Minister for EU Affairs and Chief Negotiator said Turkey needed a new Constitution.

Bagis said the following:

"It is impossible to access the EU with such a Constitution. We need to cooperatively attain a Constitution that fits Turkey. We have been addressing the opposition parties for months. All the parties should prepare a draft Constitution. Then our Constitution Commission and the Parliament should review the best parts of those drafts and make out a good Constitution text that fits Turkey. It is time to attain a Constitution that every citizen living in this country would own. The current Constitution is a military one written in the aftermath of a military coup. Only a minimum democracy can be achieved with a military Constitution. We need to join hands if we really want democracy. I have been making this call for months; however the opposition parties haven't said a word yet."

Stating that no one should long for general elections in Turkey this year, Bagis said that they received the authority from public until next July and the period to be experienced until that day would be a period for working, reforming and raising Turkey's standards.

Bagis said that they carried out important activities in the previous year and would do more in this year. Reminding that 12 of 35 chapters were opened and 2 of the remaining 23 were chapters not to be negotiated; Bagis added that the opening of environment chapter had many technical difficulties.

Pointing that the negotiation documents of chapters were 3 or 4 pages normally, Bagis said that they submitted to the Commission 1500 pages of strategy document to open the 80-paged environment chapter and that the 27 EU states approved it.

Stating that together with the opening of the environment chapter, they provided a cleaner air to breath in the country; Bagis said "We are banning the use of diesel oil, which should be used in rural areas, in municipal buses in city centers."

Bagis said that four areas –culture, arts, agriculture and fisheries- were determined under the scope of "Civil Society Dialogue-2 Project" to which financial assistance would be given and added "I am calling all the chambers and non-governmental organizations to enter the web page of Secretariat General for EU Affairs, to examine the information concerning this call there and to apply for those funds. The EU provides financial assistance to projects having a budget of 50 thousand euro to 200 thousand euro. They are all grants."

Expounding that Turkey started to follow a new process in its EU strategy, Bagis gave information about the strategy including four pillars that were determined as from this year:

"In the first pillar we are working to close the chapters opened. As for the second pillar, now that French President Sarkozy has blocked the chapter on agriculture, shall we stop developing on agriculture which is the revenue of nearly 25% of the population? Of course we are continuing the works regarding the development on agriculture. Three sides of our country are surrounded by seas; however we still don't have a Directorate of Seafood. We have to establish such a Directorate to open the chapter on agriculture. We have prepared its Law and this year we are changing the organization structure of Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Areas and establishing Directorate General of Seafood."

Visiting Kutahya Governor Sukru Kocatepe and Kutahya Mayor Mustafa Ica under the framework of his Kutahya visit, Bagis also visited Tavsanlı district of Kutahya and met with Tavsanlı District Governor Numan Hatipoglu and Tavsanlı Mayor Mustafa Guler.

Source: AA