Polish Ambassador Michalski: “Poland’s EU Process is an Important Model for Turkey”

Diplomatic visits organized by the International Strategic Research Organization (ISRO) is going on to take place. A committee headed by Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sedat Laciner visited the Ambassador of Republic of Poland to Ankara, Grzegorz Michalski, in his Office on 15 September 2006. ISRO Vice-Chairman and Chairman of Center for European Union Studies Assoc. Prof. Dr. Mehmet Ozcan, ISRO Vice-Chairman and Chairman of Center for International Security, Terrorism and Ethnic Conflict Studies Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ihsan Bal and the researcher of European Union Studies Center Fatma Yilmaz also participated in the visit.

Possible organizational cooperation between Republic of Poland and the ISRO to take place in the future is the main subject discussed during the visit. The Ambassador Michalski said that he is the follower of the ISRO activities and the ISRO is a closely followed organization in the international platform through its contribution to Turkey’s EU process with its new and different vision.

Emphasizing the importance of the Polish experience acquired during its EU negotiation process for Turkey, the Ambassador pointed out that Poland had also difficulties in this process but it was not demoralized; instead, it managed to overcome the process thanks to their experts, negotiators and, more importantly, thanks to their patience. Moreover, he added that similar difficulties are on the case for Turkey in the negotiation process.

The Ambassador said that Turkey-Poland relations should not be assessed only within the perspective of the EU, these cooperationist countries have a long history and their common interests overlap in a broad range of area. He made emphasis on the European energy security as an example.

ISRO Chairman Assoc. Prof. Dr. Sedat Laciner said that Poland is a major example to be utilized and this is why Turkey should take into consideration the Polish experience in the EU process. He also stated that making researches on this subject, ISRO, as an organization, follows the Polish experience carefully and it was possible to increase the efficiency of the current cooperation potential.

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Mehmet Ozcan, Chairman of the ISRO Center for the European Union Studies, stated that there are only few EU member states which have similar socio-economic structure with Turkey, therefore it requires for Turkey to make use of their experience in terms of the harmonization to the EU policies. He said that owing to this case, ISRO gives their attention to Greece, Spain, Portugal and Poland in their research; however, ISRO prefers to focus more on the Polish case since Poland is a new-comer of the EU which experienced the long and tiring EU negotiation process.

Assoc. Prof. Dr. Ihsan Bal, Chairman of Center for International Security, Terrorism and Ethnic Conflict Studies, also emphasized the necessity of forming a common platform in terms of the common security policies for the Turkish-Polish bilateral relations.

In addition, during the visit, it is agreed on the subjects of necessity of forming several projects about the exchange of experts and trainees between two countries in order to increase the efficiency of the reciprocal researches for the EU negotiation process.

The Ambassador of the Republic of Poland to Ankara, Grzegorz Michalski, will make a visit to the ISRO within the month of October in order to fulfill a round-table meeting. He will share the Polish experience acquired during its EU negotiation process with the ISRO researchers and the other researchers who are interested in this subject.
Source: turkishweekly.net