http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/n.php?n=turkey-prevails-in-bosnia-case-against-top-nato-powers-2010-04-23 Turkish press “celebrations” for the Turkish “diplomatic victory” in getting Bosnia “on the road” to NATO membership. No further comment is needed. Turkey prevails against top NATO powers in Bosnia case Font Size: Larger <javascript:ts('body',1)> |Smaller <javascript:ts('body',-1)> Friday, April 23, 2010 SERKAN DEMİRTAŞ TALLINN - Hürriyet Daily News Turkey’s months-long campaign to set the course for Bosnia and Herzegovina’s future NATO membership has yielded a positive result at the alliance’s meeting in the Estonian capital, Tallinn, despite strong opposition from major powers. NATO foreign ministers agreed late Thursday to approve a Membership Action Plan, or MAP, for Bosnia following a day-long, heated debate over the wording of the decision. NATO spokesman James Appathurai said the ministers had “attached a clear condition on the implementation of the membership action plan,” which is seen as the penultimate step to joining the world’s largest military alliance. However, the ministers “remain concerned that the defense property issue is not yet resolved,” Appathurai said, referring to the need for Bosnia’s three ethnic communities to hand over military property to the federal government. The final statement on the MAP was expected to be announced later Friday by NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu hailed NATO’s decision as “historic” for Turkey, Bosnia and NATO. “We decided to grant a MAP for Bosnia last night following long discussions,” he said. “With this decision, NATO has shown solidarity with Bosnia and given a new horizon for Bosnia and Herzegovina for future membership.” Davutoğlu said Bosnia’s NATO bid was a big test for the international community, adding that the alliance showed ethical responsibility for Bosnia. “We hope Bosnia will be a full member of NATO,” he said. Bosnian Foreign Minister Sven Alkalaj called it a great day for the country. “We are very grateful to our 28 friends at NATO,” Alkalaj said. “We are committed to our strategic goal of joining NATO as a full member. We will always remember this day.” Though the approval of a MAP is the penultimate step to joining the world’s biggest military alliance, it can take a country years to fulfill the plan’s criteria. “It’s a very important development for Bosnia and the region,” a senior Turkish diplomat told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review on Friday. “This is a sort of guarantee for Bosnia and Herzegovina’s political unity and territorial integrity,” the diplomat said, noting that the country is still trying to reform the constitution written after the Bosnia War in the mid-1990s. A group of key NATO countries, led by the United States, and including France, Germany and the Netherlands, had argued in December against the idea of accepting Sarajevo’s application for a MAP, saying Bosnia is far from meeting the required criteria. These requirements include the destruction of arms, participation in the International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF, in Afghanistan and the registration of immovable properties. “Right after the December meeting, we sent delegations to Bosnia to work on these priorities. While helping the Bosnian government fulfill them, we also kept the matter on the agenda at our meetings with our allies, especially with Washington,” the Turkish diplomat said. By the time of the Tallinn meeting, Bosnia could meet two-and-a-half of the three top priorities listed, allowing the Balkan country to secure its desired MAP. “It has not been an easy process to get to this point,” the Turkish diplomat added, noting that at the beginning of the process, only Turkey and Slovenia were in favor of a MAP for Bosnia. “But we have witnessed an increase in the number of countries [in support] during this process because our arguments were strong and politically sound.” Tense debate Bosnia’s neighbors and other countries in the region have given critical support to Turkey’s efforts. Serbia, however, had opposed NATO membership for Bosnia due to the Kosovo War, a position also held by ethnic Serbs in Bosnia. The real debate on the issue occurred during a dinner of NATO foreign ministers at the alliance’s December meeting in Brussels. Davutoğlu had engaged in a thorough debate with representatives of the countries that opposed granting a MAP to Bosnia during the meeting, which a senior American diplomat later called “a terrible dinner.” “It is unacceptable,” Davutoğlu told his fellow ministers, in reaction to a draft penned by the American delegation about Bosnia’s appeal, according to the senior diplomat, who was present at the meeting. Recalling the bitter times the Balkan country had endured, which included the killings of nearly 250,000 Bosnians, Davutoğlu told the meeting participants: “It is your moral responsibility to approve this. If Bosnia is in this shape today, it is because you turned your back on what happened to this country in the 1990s. Now you should do the right thing.” The discussion became so tense in that meeting that wine glasses were spilled on British Foreign Secretary David Miliband and Davutoğlu three times. “This part of the table is like the Balkans,” Rasmussen said, jokingly. “It was at that meeting, in fact, that we succeeded in getting today’s fruit. During today’s meeting, we successfully observed that more than 15 countries supported Turkey’s arguments and the four countries [in opposition] remained alone,” the Turkish diplomat said Thursday. As the bureaucrats of NATO countries continued working on the wording of the decision late Thursday in Tallinn, the Turkish and Bosnian delegations had already begun to celebrate the victory at a nearby restaurant
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