Turkey is at the centre of an historic set of events in coming days concerning its relations with Europe and the Muslim world. There is a real opportunity to settle these relationships on a long-term basis.
At its summit meeting next week in Copenhagen the European Union is to reach agreement on the final terms for enlargement with Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Malta and Cyprus, enabling them to join in 2004. Romania and Bulgaria will not join for several more years, as they take time to prepare themselves. Turkey has been a formal applicant for 30 years, but is now determined to agree a date on which to begin EU accession negotiations. The summit has to decide whether to do that.
EU leaders must take account of several major political and geopolitical considerations. The most important concerning the relationship between Europe, Islam and democracy. Turkey has for centuries been a European power and remains oriented towards Europe politically, economically and culturally. It is a secular state, with a Muslim culture; those who argue that Turkey is not European usually mean to say Islam and European values are incompatible. By arguing recently that Turkish entry would be "the end of Europe"
Mr Valery Giscard d’Estaing brought this issue into the open, forcing most of its leaders to say in public the EU is not a Christian club and must accommodate Muslim peoples and identities within its growing diversity.
This proved a healthy exercise. It is made more important by the outcome of the recent Turkish elections, which gave the moderate Islamist Justice and Development Party a sweeping victory, on a platform of reforms associated with EU membership. To disappoint those expectations would endanger the association of Islam and democracy so necessary to avoid the "war against terrorism" becoming a civilisational war between the West and the Islamic world.
In return for the setting of a date Turkey will have to extend its human and democratic rights. It is likely to agree to allow NATO assets to be used by the EU's Rapid Reaction Force. It will maintain pressure on the Turkish Cypriots to reach agreement with the Greek Cypriots on the island's future. And it is likely to ease the way for the United States to use Turkish facilities for any war against Iraq.
Realistically it would take at least a decade before Turkey could join the EU, but the target itself will resonate through all these issues.