| |
| |
 |
| |
|
| |
|
| |
|
BRUSSELS : EU ministers granted membership negotiations to Iceland on Monday, but scotched suggestions of fast-track entry fearing a repeat of Norway's double rejection at the polls.
Formal talks open in Brussels on Tuesday after the European Union fixed its "negotiating framework" despite differences with Iceland notably over whale hunting and a bank collapse that hit British and Dutch investors.
But foreign ministers and diplomats alluded to signs of waning enthusiasm on the north-Atlantic island since it lodged its application last summer at the height of a financial crisis that decimated its banking sector.
Reykjavik has said it hoped to wrap up talks by the end of this year and join by 2012, but ministers said there would be no special favours -- especially as Iceland's 300,000 population will still have to agree via a referendum.
"You have to want to join Europe," said French European affairs minister Pierre Lellouche.
"I don't get the impression... that the Icelandic people are overly favourable, that's the problem," Lellouche said.
Iceland had been expected to leapfrog Turkey and become the 29th EU nation, after Croatia next year.
But diplomats have long memories, and they recall that leading Arctic nation Norway twice rejected entry in 1972 and 1994.
Iceland's government turned towards the EU in a bid to seek economic refuge.
But Tuesday sees only the start of a painstaking process of harmonising laws and policies, for all Iceland is more advanced in many areas than longstanding candidates Turkey or Western Balkan nations.
Iceland is already integrated via the European Economic Area, the EU-led European single market, home to more than half a billion people and the world's biggest trading bloc, something Switzerland's people rejected in a 1992 referendum there.
Reykjavik is also part of the European passport-free Schengen travel zone, and it is estimated that three quarters of its laws are in tune with EU demands.
But more than 90 percent of Icelanders rejected negotiated compensation to savers during the economic crisis in a referendum result that still rankles some policymakers.
And with EU diplomatic efforts focused on enticing Serbia and Kosovo towards the bloc, anything that looks like "short cuts" for Iceland could create problems elsewhere.
"We are firmly behind Iceland's accession," Lellouche added. "But under the same conditions as the other candidates, without any short cuts -- and on condition that the Icelanders themselves are keen.
"We're not in the business of forcing people to join," he said smiling.
Belgian Foreign Minister Steven Vanackere warned that Icelandic counterpart Oessur Skarphedinsson would have to start convincing sceptics come Tuesday's talks.
"The whole idea of having public support for the operation is something which has been raised during (Monday's) meeting, there needs to be public support from the people of Iceland," Vanackere said.
Skarphedinsson told the Frettabladid daily that in his opinion, the real negotiations would not begin before mid-2011, when difficult issues such as fisheries, agriculture, financial services and detailed environmental questions would come up.
And Vanackere underlined that as long as "the last chapter is not resolved, nothing is resolved."
- AFP /ls
|
