Merkel: ‘Turkey should not become an
EU member’
German chancellor makes bold pledge
and judged overall victor in TV debate
8 HOURS AGO by: Stefan Wagstyl and Guy Chazan in Berlin
Angela Merkel on Sunday unexpectedly promised to try to end
Turkey’s EU accession talks in a live televised German election debate, amid
escalating tensions between Berlin and Turkish president Recep Tayyip
Erdogan.
The German chancellor was seemingly bounced into making this
unusually bold pledge by Martin Schulz, her social democrat challenger, who was
the first to say he would break off the talks if he won the parliamentary poll
on September 24.
The exchanges came with 12 German citizens now under arrest
in Turkey in a crackdown by Mr Erdogan on regime critics and journalists that
is widely seen in the EU as politically motivated and anti-democratic.
“The fact is clear that Turkey should not become an EU
member,” said Ms Merkel, in an unprecedentedly clear rejection of Ankara’s
accession hopes. She pledged to talk to EU partners about “a joint
position . . . so that we can end these accession talks”.
The exchange over Turkey was the high point of a
wide-ranging debate in which Mr Schulz attacked Ms Merkel with surprising force
over Turkey and also over refugee policy.
But, while viewers were impressed with his aggression, they
judged Ms Merkel the overall winner of the encounter. Some 55 per cent of those
polled for ARD television found the chancellor convincing against 35 per cent
for Mr Schulz.
If the polls are correct, Mr Schulz appears to have failed
to capitalise on the campaign’s only television debate involving Ms Merkel or
to revive his flagging chances of defeating the chancellor as she aims for a
fourth term.
“Martin Schulz
performed well,” said Frank Brettschneider, communications professor at
Hohenheim University. “But he could not upset Angela Merkel and put her
decisively under pressure.”
However, on Turkey at least, he forced her to harden her
position on live television — an unusual development for a cautious chancellor
who normally avoids changing policy on the hoof.
The moment was all the more dramatic because by being the
first to pledge ending accession talks, Mr Schulz broke with an SPD tradition
in which the party has long been more positive about Ankara’s EU bid than Ms
Merkel’s conservative Christian Democrats.
Ms Merkel balanced her newfound hard line over accession
with promises to maintain dialogue with Turkey, not least over the 12 detained
Germans. She said: “I do not intend to break off diplomatic relations with
Turkey.”
Brussels, which has already frozen Turkey's entry
negotiations, is now likely to consider further action.
Mr Schulz, for whom the debate was a rare chance to confront
Ms Merkel directly, also attacked the chancellor over her decision in the
summer of 2015 to keep open Germany’s borders for asylum seekers.
He accused her of having failed to consult EU partners
properly before taking action in a crisis which has led to hundreds of
thousands of asylum seekers coming into Germany and strained relations with
European partners.
Focusing on a recent statement from the chancellor when she
said she would do the same again as she did two years ago, Mr Schulz said with
surprising force: “Merkel said she would do the same as in 2015: I would not
agree at all . . . We need a European solution to the problem, and we lost this
[with Merkel’s approach].”
Ms Merkel responded by saying that she had implemented the
first article of the German constitution which upholds human rights.
“There are moments in the life of a chancellor where you
have to make a decision,” she said. But she admitted that “not everybody can
come to us . . . we learnt this in the last few years”.
But both leaders agreed to promise action on one of the most
sensitive political issues, delays in the deportation of failed asylum seekers.
They were also united on backing legal changes to permit
class-action suits for owners of diesel cars affected by the emissions scandal,
and on cracking down on radical Islamic preachers.
Many Germans complained that, Turkey aside, there was too
little to distinguish the two candidates.
“More a duet than a duel,” said Rainald Becker, an ARD
television commentator. Bärbel Szymanski, who watched the debate in Berlin at
one of many public viewings of the broadcast, said: “Neither won because they
were so similar.”
Ms Merkel’s Democratic Social Union and its Bavarian
partner, the Christian Social Union lead the SPD by 38 per cent to 24 per cent,
according to the latest opinion polls by the Emnid agency.
The numbers have changed little since the late spring, when
a surge of support that Mr Schulz secured when he took over the SPD in January,
fizzled out.
The chancellor has deliberately taken a low-key approach,
reminding voters of Germany’s economic success and her role as a stable anchor
in an unstable international environment.
Sem comentários:
Enviar um comentário