"Turkey also plays an exceptionally important role in our relationship with the closer and more distant neighborhood area of the European Union. (Turkey) is a significant factor of stability for the Caucasus, for Central Asia, and for the whole Middle East. The start of negotiations with Turkey is looming. The European Council has decided to start on 3 October. Until then, we will have to find agreement upon a common negotiating framework within the European Union. Everyone knows that Austria has been very active in its support to protect the openness of the negotiating goal. It is now a question of working through the negotiating process step by step, chapter by chapter, in a professional and conscientious manner. The European Council has reiterated the Union's ability to take in new members as a condition, alongside compliance with the accession criteria on the part of the candidate. At this occasion, I would like to refer to the remarkable process of reform that has taken place in Turkey in the past years. Yesterday, Abdullah Gül and I had the opportunity to comment on that before the media, but I also want to acknowledge this before him: these reforms are far-reaching, they will be sustainable, and we will accompany (Turkey) supportively in this process, even if we know the negotiations with the European Union will take their time, and they will perhaps not always be very easy."

Ursula Plassnik's speech at the Europa-Forum Wachau in the presence of Abdullah Gül, Turkish foreign minister. Stift Göttweig, Austria, 4 June 2005