EU steunt Erdogan in strijd tegen verbod regeringspartij (en)
The EU is supporting embattled Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan in his struggle with prosecutors who want his moderate Islamist party shut down, with the bloc's enlargement chief saying the accession process will go ahead despite the ongoing constitutional crisis.
Enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn i said on the weekend that attempts by the country's Constitutional Court to ban the centre-right Justice & Development Party (AK Party) may be in violation of Turkey's constitution, which "states very clearly that the Turkish republic is a democratic and secular state."
On Friday (14 March), the country's top prosecutor, Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya, filed a suit with the courts to have the party outlawed and the prime minister and 70 other AK Party members banned from politics for five years, accusing the officials of attempting to build an Islamic state.
Commissioner Rehn, however, said that the constitutional crisis in Turkey would not stall the country's bid to join the EU. "The EU accession process of Turkey is alive and moving forward," he said.
"It should not ...[affect Turkey's EU bid], and it is important the Turkey now move on with its reforms," said the commissioner in an interview with Bloomberg TV.
Mr Erdogan, for his part, has condemned the prosecutor's actions as undemocratic: "What they are uneasy about is the will of the nation and national sovereignty, not the AK Party. What they are harming is democracy and state of law, not the AKP," he said, reports Turkish daily Hurriyet
Turkey's negotiations with the EU over eventual membership in the bloc have been launched in six out of 35 policy areas while one has been completed.
Analysts say that the prosecutors, linked to the army, which sees itself as the guarantor of securlarism in the country, have wanted to attempt a ban on the AK Party for some time, and the government's recent manoeuvres to lift a ban on the wearing of headscarves in universities have provided them with the excuse to do so.
Meanwhile, MEPs are backing the Turkish leader in his struggle with the prosecutor. The Liberal grouping in the European Parliament has said that while it supports secularism in Turkey, it opposes the banning of political parties.
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