At the European Political Community Summit in Prague, Turkey experienced the positive effect of being the only country that could talk to Russia and Ukraine. This is what we all know, now it is useful to write what we do not know at all. Turkey started to prepare a different intellectual infrastructure to end the Ukraine-Russia war and share it with some capitals in the West. The intellectual infrastructure prepared by Turkey started with the examination of all the speeches made by Russian President Putin since the beginning of the war. The conclusion was that Moscow wanted a long-term bargain with the West. At this point, Turkey is planning to bring the four biggest countries of the West, the USA, France, Germany and England, to the same table with Russia. This plan has not yet been shared with all Western capitals, but has been transmitted to the United States through important and private channels. Initial comments on the plan by influential figures in Washington are quite positive. Their only question is whether Russia can be contacted for such a dialogue. Having gained a lot of experience in shuttle diplomacy, Turkey’s answer is a clear yes. Ankara also respects Ukraine’s will and tells through open channels that war must return to peace without the use of tactical nuclear weapons. Turkey is evolving from being a country that can establish a dialogue with both Kyiv and Moscow, to a country that establishes a game with this dialogue. It should not be surprising if the West and Moscow come to the table in the near future thanks to Turkey.
The mountain that will give birth to mice…
The name “European Political Community Leaders Summit” is very cool, but no one knows where the business will evolve. The European Union is involved, but in the letter sent to the 17 participating countries invited to the summit, it was also stated that this structure is not an alternative process to the EU and not an alternative to EU negotiations.
Since Czechia is the Term President of the European Union, the summit was held in Prague, but the real owner of the idea is French President Macron. It is clear that Macron’s main aim is to leave Russia alone in the region, but for now, the summit has not gone beyond being a roundtable meeting where 44 heads of state and government will discuss topics such as security and stability, energy, economy, trade, transportation and infrastructure in the European continent.
If Macron is the inventor of a business, it is absolutely necessary to check whether the idea is original or not. French political scientists said that the idea put forward by Macron is similar to the project prepared by former French President Mitterrand for the central and eastern European countries that left the Soviet Union in 1991. That project was finished before it started due to the objections of the USA and Germany. This time there was at least one meeting.
There was a lot of talk about whether Turkey should be invited to this summit. The public is not very aware of it, but we received the invitation letter relatively late, on September 23. The reason for the invitation is not because they love Turkey, but because they think that this European Political Community would be dead without Turkey. Turkey and England alone have a size close to the sum of the population and economic size of the other 15 participating countries. Not to mention the critically important aspect of geography.
The answer to the question of where this business can lead is actually not difficult. The 27-member European Union has turned into a cumbersome structure that has created its own bureaucracy. It is mentioned that in the near future, Brussels will change its decision-making mechanisms, that 6-7 countries will be formed around it, a ring of other EU member states, and countries that are in the negotiation process with the EU outside that ring. Could it be, the European Union, which cannot take a decision and becomes clumsy, may deviate from this path instead of losing members.
In fact, what no one says is this: The European Union will not make Turkey a full member, but it does not want Turkey to move away from the EU either. Remember, former French President Sarkozy made his one-day visit to Ankara as the President of the Mediterranean Union, not as the President of France. It is impossible not to see that in all such structures, there is an effort to keep Turkey connected to the EU without making Turkey a member of the EU.
Turkey did not have great expectations from the summit held yesterday. Both political and diplomatic circles voiced that such structures cast a shadow over Turkey’s status as a candidate country for full membership. Ukraine’s first reaction to the summit was “We want to become a member of the EU, such alternatives are invalid for us”. Despite justified skepticism, we can also read President Erdogan’s participation in the summit as Ankara’s statement, “I did not give up on the Western camp, you are the inconsistent.”
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