EU seeks to accelerate Turkey's stalled accession process

The European Union is seeking to accelerate Turkey?s almost stalled accession negotiation process by annexing a set of priorities and concrete recommendations to its soon-to-be released progress report, seen as a short-term road map for the next government to be formed after Nov. 1 elections. 

These concrete recommendations cover an implementation period of 12 to 18 months so that more negotiation chapters can be opened as part of Turkey?s accession process, started in 2005. Turkey opened only 14 chapters out of 35 and closed only one of them. Croatia, which began negotiations on the same day as Turkey, joined the EU in mid-2013.  

As the EU is preparing to release its annual report on Oct. 21 or Oct. 22 in which it will assess the state of human rights and fundamental freedoms within the last 12 months period, it will, for the first time, annex a document to outline its recommendations to Turkey?s next government. This year?s report is expected to be made of three main parts. 

The first part will assess the state of Turkey?s accession process, as a sort of picture of the point Turkey has reached so far. This picture will also be important in regards of shaping Turkey?s next actions.

The second part will assess Turkey?s last 12 months in terms of its performance on negotiation chapters as well as its human rights and democratization process. It?s expected the report will highlight overall human rights violations as Turkey?s number one issue as well as restrictions on freedom of expression, freedom of press and the Kurdish peace process. The EU?s criticisms on the home security package and internet laws would also be detailed in this part. 

The third part, however, will contain concrete recommendations for the acceleration...