The real problem started in 2006 although the EU accession negotiations with Turkey had been delayed as much as possible by EU countries beginning in 1996. By 2003, it was obvious that Turkey fulfilled the Copenhagen criteria much better than some of the official candidate countries. Still, it took two more years and a number of very tense negotiations to restart the negotiations in October 2005, at a time when 10 candidate countries (including Greek Cyprus) were already members of the EU.Looking backward, the strategy of the EU to keep Turkey at an arm's length looks perfectly rational. Turkey was too close and integrated to all the European institutions to be totally ignored, it was too unwanted for a possible EU member. So the only way to keep Turkey at bay was to accept Greek Cyprus as a member state (also to ease the anger of Greece, which was blackmailing to stop the whole enlargement if Greek Cyprus was not accepted).It was perhaps a good idea on the part of Turkey skeptics in the EU to extend delaying Turkish accession, but it was not really feasible by following a conventional path for the negotiations. That is why negotiations came to a halt after only a year in 2006. The reason it was invoked was the refusal by Turkey to open its ports and airports to Greek Cypriot ships and planes. In fact, there was a solution already accepted for that in exchange of easing the embargo over Northern Cyprus. Turkey was already willing to lift this embargo on Greek Cypriot ships, which, by the way, was largely ignored most of the time. That was too much for Greek Cyprus, whose driver at that time was the Russian Federation. They have sabotaged all openings toward Northern Cyprus and therefore, it created an ideal opportunity for some EU member states to effectively suspend accession negotiation process.The trouble is that once destroyed, the dynamics of membership reforms are very hard to regenerate. It would have required a genuine political will on the part of the EU to re-ignite this motivation in Turkey for membership. Instead, a scenario looking very much like the closed doors policy applied to the U.K. in the 1960s has been opted. Contrary of the U.K., whose governments in the 1950s and '60s largely underestimated the impact of the EU, Turkey's government has stood firm. Occasions to leave the table and slam the door have been numerous, but Turkish officials always opted to stay at the table. Over time, there was nothing on the table to negotiate, but theoretically, negotiations never ceased.Turkey has become, slowly but surely, a problem whose solution would be too costly for the EU no matter what it is – so it had to stay in a kind of limbo. But international developments have gained momentum since the Arab Spring and Turkey today is hosting around 2 million refugees from its southern neighbors. The response of the EU, as an institution, has been to help Greece to strengthen its border with Turkey. Bulgaria would like to build a wire fence of about 50 kilometers to secure its border with Turkey. Invoking possible repercussions of illegal immigration is one thing, trying to draw a line between Europe and Turkey, a NATO country, is altogether a different story.Without the existence of Turkey, there would have been a large scale humanitarian disaster in Europe. Trying to avert this kind of turmoil cannot be done through establishing a local kind of European fortress. Accepting countries like Bulgaria as full members has already severely undermined the ideals of the EU, helping such countries to build up new fences will not revive the ideology of the EU's founders. Turkey has lost any kind of momentum long ago, but what is at stake is the very existence and development of the EU. À bon entendeur, salut, as one might possibly imagine Jean Monnet perhaps might have said.