British EU presidency proffers an olive branch to Turkey

The British EU presidency has signalled that it intends to make a major effort to mend the EU's precarious relationship with Turkey.

Announcing that it will host a "European conference" of member and applicant states on March 12th in London, the Foreign Secretary, Mr Robin Cook, went out of his way to emphasise that the terms set down by the Luxembourg summit for participation were "expectations not preconditions".

Mr Cook was briefing Brussels-based journalists on the British presidency.

The implication is clear - if Turkey goes some way to meeting the EU's concerns over human rights, international arbitration over territorial disputes with Greece and co-operation with the Cyprus accession negotiations it will be welcome in London. The British presidency yesterday swung into action with the traditional opening meeting with the European Commission.

Afterwards, the President of the Commission, Mr Jacques Santer, went out of his way to praise the new conciliatory and co-operative tone of the British approach. It was, he told journalists, "as refreshing as it is highly appreciated", an unusually explicit swipe at the Tories which is certain to enrage them.

Mr Blair told the press conference he was delighted and privileged to be taking over the presidency of the EU at this historic time.

Britain, he said, was determined to play its part in the successful launch of the euro. As in every previous presidency, the need for Europe to become more comprehensible and relevant to its citizens - "a people's Europe" - was also emphasised.

It is on the foreign policy front that the presidency faces its most difficult challenge. Both Mr Blair and Mr Santer at their joint meeting acknowledged in forthright language the crucial need to play a role in defusing the Algerian crisis, although EU leaders are mystified as to what they can do in the absence of a willingness on the part of the Algerian government to accept help.

"We can't stand by in the face of atrocities," Mr Santer told them.

It was no longer enough for Europe's role on the world stage to be confined to "paying the bills", he said.

Britain's hand of friendship extended to Turkey may well be cut off by Greece or Germany if the approach taken is seen to be too conciliatory.

Mr Cook made clear, however, that although he wanted Turkish Cypriot participation in the Cypriot EU accession negotiations, he was not going to allow their refusal, or Turkish non-participation in the European Conference, to hold up talks. There was much useful work they could do in a "unique form" for pre-accession and member-states. "I am not going to Ankara on bended knees over broken glass to beg them to come," Mr Cook told journalists. With or without the Turks, he said, it would be a "conference of substance and importance, and of historic significance". At the meeting with the Commission, Mr Blair emphasised four main themes of the British presidency - jobs, EMU, the environment and competitiveness - all crucial he said, to giving people a sense that the Union was working for them.

It was necessary, he argued, to show that enlargement would mean prosperity not only for new members but also for existing ones. Mr Blair is also understood to have insisted that fundamental reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) should start under the British presidency, although both that issue and the reform of structural funds are likely to run on after the October German election.

The Commissioner for Social Affairs, Mr Padraig Flynn, will take comfort from the presidency's agreement at the meeting that member-states will be expected to submit action plans on employment by as soon as April 15th. This will give the Commission time to respond before a debate at the June Cardiff summit. Mr Flynn is determined to see the momentum, established by the jobs summit in November, maintained.