"European Union will beg Turkey to join"

Source: Tanjug, APA

VIENNA -- Turkish Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan has said that the European Union (EU) has been treateding his country "unfairly" for five decades.

However, he also voiced his conviction that "the day will come when Brussels will beg Turkey to become a member".
"The EU is still giving us the cold shoulder, although Turkey, unlike most EU countries, meets the Maastricht criteria. However, the day will come when they will be begging us to join," Caglayan said in an interview with the APA news agency.

He stressed that when that day comes, "Turkey would then decide whether to join or not".

Turkey, according to the minister, "has a right to join the EU" and has no intention of withdrawing from the negotiations.

However, Caglayan noted, it was an open question whether the euro will still exist by the time of his country's accession.

"The EU is reaping what they sow," he said about the current crisis.

Caglayan said that Turkey has managed to reduce its debt from 73 to 39 percent, and that no bank in that country was facing problems.

Turkey's economy, he said, last year grew by 8.5 percent, while the European grew only by 1.5 percent. Had Turkey been a member, the minister calculated, EU's growth would have been 1.8 percent.

"We will continue to upset Europeans. There are people who want to turn the EU into a Christian club and (leave) the Turkish state outside. We will not allow for that to happen," Caglayan said.