If and when Turkey does become a member, it will be after years of structural reforms and with a long track record of sustained and stable growth,
We have just made history, ... an EU based on values, not just history. Turkey has always been a European country.
When Western Europe needed defense, along with the United States, it looked to Turkey for that defense on its eastern flank against the then-Soviet Union, ... No issues were then raised that it had an Islamic majority.
The EU and the European people have always seen Turkey as a European state, ... The heavy responsibility rests on all member states. ... I don't want to contemplate the possibility of a veto.
Anchor Turkey in the West and we gain a beacon of democracy and modernity - a country with a Muslim majority - which will be a shining example across the whole of its neighboring region,
I would have preferred it if the government of Turkey had not felt it necessary to issue its declaration... by doing so the process has frankly been made more difficult,