EUROPEAN COUNCIL: ENLARGEMENT TALKS TOP COPENHAGEN AGENDA.

Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey.

Even if the current 'wave' of enlargement is wrapped up with most of the weekend still intact, the rest of the summit will nevertheless be taken up with another major historical challenge: whether to grant Turkey a date to start negotiations on joining the EU (see separate article in this issue, Section V). A Franco-German plan agreed by President Jacques Chirac and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder envisages a decision in the second half on 2004 on starting negotiations in 2005 following an assessment report from the Commission on whether Ankara had met the EU's Copenhagen criteria on democracy, human rights and market economy. At the moment, EU Member States are divided between those who would like to fix a date without conditions and those who would like it much tougher for Turkey to qualify for the start of negotiations. The outcome of the summit will largely therefore depend on the progress on finding a solution to the status of the divide island of Cyprus and in particular whether the Turks and Turkish Cypriots will accept the United Nations plan Council for a loose confederation of states with a number of safeguards to ensure the fair representation of the two communities in its governing institutions. There is also hope that Turkey could deliver the long-awaited breakthrough on access for the EU to NATO assets which would allow the Union to launch its first peace-keeping mission under its fledgling European Security and Defence Policy in Macedonia. EU leaders are also expected to adopt an 'updated road map' for Bulgaria and Romania, with increased pre-accession assistance and based on a membership target date of 2007.

EU business in view of enlargement.

Another issue raised by the enlargement process will see the European Council take note of an initial report from the Danish Presidency setting out various options for organising the currently rotational EU Presidency. The Presidency says that discussion to date have revealed a "large measure of...