Tyrkiet og EU
29. okt 2005 10:29, Læn Dem Ud
Man kan ikke undgå at se den dybe ironi i, at den tyrkiske forfatter Orhan Pamuk på den ene side er blevet misbrugt af de europæiske højre-nationalister som et argument for, hvorfor Tyrkiet ikke bør optages i EU. Når Pamuk på den anden side selv, giver et af de mest følelsesladede indlæg for, hvorfor Tyrkiet netop bør optages.
Orhan Pamuk: As others see us
...
However, I have one vision of Europe that is constant. Let me begin by saying that Europe is a very delicate, very sensitive question for a Turk. Here we are, knocking on your door, and asking to come in, full of high hopes and good intentions, but also feeling rather anxious and fearing rejection. I feel such things as keenly as other Turks, and what we all feel is very much akin to the "silent shame" I was describing earlier. As Turkey knocks on Europe's door, as we wait and wait and Europe makes us promises, and then forgets us, only to raise the bar - and as Europe examines the full implications of Turkey's bid to become a full member, we've seen a lamentable hardening of anti-Turkish sentiment in certain parts of Europe, at least among some politicians. In the recent German elections, when certain politicians took a political line against Turks and Turkey, I found their style just as dangerous as the political style adopted by certain politicians in my own country. It is one thing to criticise the deficiencies of the Turkish state vis à vis democracy, or to find fault with its economy; it is quite another to denigrate all of Turkish culture, or those of Turkish descent in Germany whose lives are among the most difficult and impoverished in the country. As for Turks in Turkey - when they hear themselves judged so cruelly, they are reminded yet again that they are knocking on a door and waiting to be let in, and of course they feel unwelcome.The most cruel irony of all is that the fanning of nationalist anti-Turkish sentiment in Europe has provoked the coarsest nationalist backlash inside Turkey. Those who believe in the European Union must see at once that the real choice we have to make is between peace and nationalism. Either we have peace, or we have nationalism. I think that the ideal of peace sits at the heart of the European Union and I believe that the chance of peace that Turkey has offered Europe will not, in the end, be spurned.
...Europe has gained the respect of the non-western world for the ideals it has done so much to nurture: liberty, equality and fraternity. If Europe's soul is enlightenment, equality and democracy, if it is to be a union predicated on peace, then Turkey has a place in it. A Europe defining itself on narrow Christian terms will, like a Turkey that tries to derive its strength only from its religion, be an inward-looking place divorced from reality, and more bound to the past than to the future.


