Turkey's EU minister slams progress report's release day

ANKARA

“We said to the EU: Eid al-Adha is like Christmas so don’t release it [Progress Report on Turkey] that day,” EU Minister Egemen Bağış wrote in his Twitter account. AA photo

EU Minister Egemen Bağış slammed Oct.13 the European Commission’s choice of date for the release of the Progress Report on Turkey.

The bloc is set to release the report on Oct. 16, coinciding with the second day of the Eid al-Adha (Kurban Bayramı).

“We said to the EU: Eid al-Adha is like Christmas so don’t release it that day. But they don’t listen. No comments until the end of Bayram,” Bağış wrote in his Twitter account.

A senior European diplomat has earlier expressed his regret that the announcement of the next Progress Report will coincide with Turkey’s Feast of the Sacrifice but said the date could not be moved as other countries were also concerned.

The progress report is a check list on where Turkey stands in the process of aligning with the European Union.

This year’s report is expected to be one of the toughest in recent years due to the government’s heavy crackdown on the protesters during the Gezi demonstrations in June. The democratization package announced by the government on Sept. 30 is expected to be referred to in the report.