EU-Turkey meeting to be held in Brussels

By Yusuf Hatip

BRUSSELS (AA) - The EU-Turkey Association Council meeting will be held in Brussels on March 15, according to diplomatic sources on Tuesday.

The meeting of Association Council -- the highest decision-making body between Turkey and the EU -- will take place after an interval of almost four years.

The meeting, which is important for the continuation and diversification of the institutional dialogue with the EU, will be co-chaired by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini.

Johannes Hahn, the EU’s Commissioner for European Neighborhood Policy and Enlargement Negotiations, is also expected to attend the meeting.

The regional issues and bilateral relations are expected to be extensively evaluated in the meeting.

In this context, issues such as visa liberalization, updates on the Customs Union, the point reached in the EU accession process and the cooperation in the fight against terrorism are also expected to be addressed.

The 53rd meeting of the EU-Turkey Association Council was held on May 18, 2015, in Brussels.

The Turkey-EU Association Council was established in accordance with the Ankara Agreement, which entered into force on Dec. 1, 1964.

Turkey applied for EU membership in 1987 and accession talks began in 2005.

However, negotiations stalled in 2007 due to the objections of the Greek Cypriot administration on the divided island of Cyprus, as well as opposition from Germany and France.