...

Turkey-Armenia border to be opened only after Nagorno-Karabakh's occupation ends: Erdogan

Other News Materials 16 May 2009 11:49 (UTC +04:00)

Turk.net quoted Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan as saying that position of French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Turkey's EU admission is unstable.

Erdogan participated at a conference in Gdansk University in Poland and answered students' questions.

Erdogan said "Sarkozy makes different statements when we meet and when we are apart." "This is that the position that we do not want to see."

Erdogan said the EU is not obliged to announce Turkey a member, but the union must make concrete statements whether it wants to admit Turkey as full-right member or not.

"Is Turkish population concerned about the EU or the union is concerned that great part of Turkish population is Muslims?" Erdogan said. 

Erdogan said positive steps have been taken in Turkey-Armenia ties.

"We are all concerned about the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict. We can not ignore this issue," he said.

Erdogan said Turkey closed border with Armenia after Nagorno-Karabakh's occupation and added that the borders will be opened only after the occupation ends.

Erdogan said Armenia is experiencing hard times and if Turkey wants it can send back 40,000 Armenians, but Turkey's humaneness does not allow doing it.

Erdogan said he hopes the Cyprus problems will be solved soon. Turkey wants to become EU member in 50 years.

"If Turkey does not become part of the EU, the union will be only "Christian Club". This is reality," he said.

Erdogan said Turkey makes every effort to be admitted to the EU. However the country does not feel this process and is not confident that all EU members will recognize it. Erdogan headed for Turkey after the conference.

Latest

Latest