TURKEY’S new leader accused the European Union of double standards yesterday for extending membership to states with chequered human rights records while refusing to consider his country’s application.

Speaking before a visit to Washington today, where he is expected to win the support of President Bush for Ankara’s case, Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that he did not understand why the EU refused to recognise widespread reforms in Turkey over the past 18 months.

“The fact that Turkey has not got a negotiation date is a double standard in itself,” he said, after talks in Copenhagen with Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Danish Prime Minister.

Mr Rasmussen said that Turkey would get a date for entry but first needed to fulfil its political reforms, particularly with respect to human rights and the treatment of minorities. “What we need to see now is clear implementation,” Mr Rasmussen said.

Copenhagen is hosting the EU summit on Thursday when the ten candidate countries are expected to finalise joining the EU by 2004. Washington, which is seeking to use Turkish military bases for any offensive against Iraq, has been lobbying Brussels to accept Ankara’s demands.

Mr Erdogan said Brussels operated one rule for European Christian countries and another for Turkey, which has been waiting decades to join the EU. “We see six countries that have not met all of the political criteria but which have negotiation dates,” Mr Erdogan, the leader of Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party, said.

He referred in particular to the poor treatment of some minorities, like the large ethnic Russian population in the Baltic state of Latvia, where Russian speakers are victims of discrimination, and the status of the Roma, or Gypsies, in central and eastern European countries.

Despite his tough stance, there were signs yesterday that a compromise between Turkey and the EU was still possible. France and Germany suggested last week that Turkey be given a provisional date to start entry talks in 2005 after a review to be conducted in 2004.

Yasar Yakis, the Turkish Foreign Minister, said in Brussels yesterday that Ankara might be satisfied with a date to begin entry talks next year.

“It is understandable that EU leaders want to see how the reforms are implemented,” he said. “We think that a period of six months would be sufficient to see that.”

In addition to the problem of Turkey’s entry, Poland and the Czech Republic also engaged in diplomatic brinkmanship yesterday by toughening their membership demands just days before negotiations are due to close.

“The Poles read out a whole list of items, point by point, where they are not satisfied with the Union’s offer. The problem is that when they see a figure, they automatically want it increased by 20 per cent,” one exasperated EU diplomat said.

Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz, Poland’s Foreign Minister, said afterwards that his Government’s hard line at the end of four years of negotiations had caught the EU by surprise.

Warsaw’s demands for higher cash transfers from Brussels, larger milk quotas and better treatment for maize farmers were not the only issues placed on the table at the last minute. The Czech Republic argued for better terms for potato starch producers and tried to increase from 90,300 to 130,300 the number of cattle covered by the EU’s suckler cow premium. Estonia also pressed for the right to continue hunting wild lynx and bears.

The demands frustrated the Danish Government, which is negotiating on behalf of the Union and is desperate to limit the summit agenda to the level of subsidies for farmers in central and eastern Europe and the overall cash transfers from Brussels to the new members.

Cyprus yesterday became the first of the ten candidate countries aiming to join the EU on May 1, 2004, to indicate formally that it could accept the membership terms. Slovakia also agreed to the terms.

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