The discussion in London organized by IntelligienceSquared which took place on February 22nd somewhat ironically titled “Let’s Keep Turkey out of Europe” was certainly a very popular one, with 6 important panel members and an audience of more then 650 people.

The discussion started with Cambridge University Academic, Dr Casey’s argument that “Europe might become part of Turkey but Turkey cannot become part of Europe”. He went further to say that recent history of Turkey included a hanged Prime Minister and the removing of an elected government from power.He concluded his speech by somewhat degrading Turkey by saying that Europe is big enough and that it doesn’t need an impotent child.

The French Political analyst, Dominique Moisi emphasised that accepting Turkey to EU is the best message anyone can give to show that we don’t believe in clash of civilisations. It is wrong to exclude a country because of its one dimension – Islam. He emphasised that if this is a debate about hope and fear, that precedence should always be hope. His most effective sentences were that EU needed Turkey in order to become what it wanted to remain as. He then asked the audience what is more important “value of geography or geography of value” – to which he confidently chose the second one.

Foreign Policy Analyst,Dr Michael Stuermer then said that Turkey’s heart was in Asia but its mind in Europe. He claimed that inviting a large, poor Muslim community will tear Europe apart. He finished his speech by quoting “keep your distance”.

Mark Leonard, the Director of Foreign Policy at the Centre for European Reform talked about how Turkey has positively changed itself in order to get the negotiations start date from EU. He mentioned that if Turkey doesn’t enter the EU then it’ll no longer be the Turkey we have now.

Broadcaster, Kevin Myers spoke with his feeling and was not as factual as the other speakers. He repeated the Wall Street Journals highly criticised comment about Turkey being the sick man of Europe. Further more he assumed that there will be mass migration to UK from Turkey if it was to be admitted into the EU. This claim was quickly dismissed when Professor Leonard pointed that with the recent enlargement of EU this sort of migration didn’t happen from countries like Poland and Latvia. He also mentioned Turkish people wouldn’t want to leave their beautiful countries.

The highlight of the evening was Professor Norman’s speech. Having lived in Turkey for more then 6 years he had a good knowledge about Turkish people and the local politics and this he frequently reflected in his arguments. Discussing if Turkey was European was not a meaningful debate according to him. He preferred to concentrate on how the EU can influence and shape Turkey’s future, especially as it has an astonishing 10% growth rate. He made analogies with Spain’s past and how it came from that era into Europe’s strongest partner.He asked, why not Turkey?

At question time it was interesting to see that majority of audience who wanted to Professionals InsightTeam get their voice heard had negative things to say about Turkey.There was an overwhelming demand from Greek-Cypriot’s to get the microphone and criticise Turkey’s policy on Cyprus.One other audience pointed out that Turkish people and Europeans were culturally different and that the societies won’t integrate. She went further to mention that “you can live for many years in Berlin without the need to speak a word of German”

However, the comments from the members of the audience had little effect on the inevitable voting results, when the people against the motion “Lets keep Turkey out of Europe” rose from 34% to 59%.