EUROPEAN COMMISSION URGES TURKEY ON QUICKER REFORM

EU chief Jose Manuel Barroso began a three-day visit to Turkey Thursday, where he is expected to urge quicker reform. A day earlier, Barroso had warned that attempts to ban the country’s Islamic-rooted governing party could harm ties with the 27-nation bloc. On Thursday, Barroso will visit the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the revered founder of modern Turkey and the symbol of its secular identity. He is scheduled to hold talks with President Abdullah Gul and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and address the Turkish parliament. He is expected to pressure Turkey to speed up economic and political reforms. Barroso is accompanied by EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn. Erdogan’s party has been accused of trying to undermine Turkey’s constitutional secular principles. "We should run toward the reform process," Gul told a Turkey-EU meeting for closer cooperation in Istanbul earlier on Thursday. "I believe this will take Turkey out of an environment of quarrel and eliminate concerns of some segments of society." "Everyone should be sensitive not to damage the principles of democracy and the institutions," he said, in an apparent reference to the ruling party. Barroso on Wednesday said the case against Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party "could have a major impact also in the way Turkey is seen" by EU nations and whether it should continue its bid to join the bloc. Barroso also reiterated his call for Turkey to revise its infamous Article 301, which makes it a crime to insult "Turkishness." The law has been used to charge hundreds of intellectuals and journalists, including Nobel literature laureate Orhan Pamuk, the AP reports. The EU opened entry talks with Turkey in 2005, but there has been little progress amid disagreements over Cyprus and opposition from France and other EU countries.

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