Far away from the hassle and turbulence of Turkey’s EU membership application is that other Turkey, the one that is growing and expanding, the economic Turkey. This time it’s cars:

“With a cluster of carmakers and part suppliers, the Turkish automotive sector has reached a critical mass and become an integral part of the global network [...]

The owner of a satirical magazine sued for publishing drawings of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s head on the bodies of animals accused the premier of intolerance on the opening day of his trial Tuesday.
Erdogan has done things like this for a while now, but I haven’t seen any mention of it in the [...]

This is a very intelligent move:
Between the rock of the French and Dutch referenda and the hard place of the looming early elections in Germany, Turkey has reiterated its determination to seek full EU membership. Ankara has also named its chief EU negotiator.
Turkey’s 38-year-old chief EU negotiator Ali Babacan is a founding member of the [...]

As if Turkey’s membership talks weren’t already under enough pressure from the French referendum, today we have the suggestion that a change of government in Germany will only serve to complicate the picture even further.

Read more… or Read more right here… [...]

People in Turkey are getting nervous. If French voters reject the Consitution Treaty later this month, it will be for a whole string of reasons, none of which necessarily are related to any of the others. Some will vote against the treaty because it is perceived as removing sovereignty too much, others because [...]

Like most numbers of the Spectator, the festive, XL-sized holiday edition is marred by the presence of Mark Steyn. But don’t let that put you off, there’s some good stuff there as well. And one of the better bits is an essay by Prof. Norman Stone on Turkey (Potential EU Accession of) (reg. req.).
For the [...]

New Europe?Late Thursday night, the European Council approved, as widely expected, the Commission’s recommendation to open membership negotiations with Turkey, largely without imposing additional conditions to be met prior to the beginning of the talks on October 3, 2005. “The time to start negotiations with Turkey has come,” Commission President Jos? Manuel Barroso said. Council [...]

Ohhhhhh, I can’t resist this. Anatole Kaletsky writing in the Times:
Turkey is likely to scupper the strongest argument in favour of ratifying the European constitution: the claim that voting rights among the EU member nations must be reformed to accommodate past and future enlargements. The fact is that, far from preparing the EU for the [...]

Amidst all the fanfare about negotiations opening on Turkey’s membership, we shouldn’t lose sight of other things that are in the pipeline. EU enlargement commissioner G?nter Verhuegen has just given Bulgaria and Romania the green light for a January 2007 target date.
?For the year 2007 we feel that accession may be appropriate and these [...]

The European Commission has recommended that accession talks for Turkey should begin, but hasn’t laid out any dates for the process:
Commission officials are reporting on the progress Turkey has already made, along with Bulgaria and Romania.
The final decision on Turkey rests with the leaders of all 25 EU member states in December - with accession [...]