Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has warned that he will wait until the end of the year to see if there is progress on accession talks with the European Union, otherwise he could put the matter to a referendum.
“You must decide right away ... we will have patience until the end of the year, and then I will go the people,” Erdogan said at a farming conference, according to state news agency Anadolu.
Erdogan was speaking as EU foreign ministers were meeting in Brussels to discuss the bloc’s relationship with Turkey.
A discussion on Ankara’s membership bid is not due until December.
Progress on Turkey’s accession has been slow, frustrating Ankara.
The Turkish leader’s firm response to a failed July coup has inflamed tensions between Brussels and Ankara.
Turkey is a long-running membership candidate and crucial partner in controlling migration, but various developments have raised concerns.
“When it comes to human rights and the rule of law, Turkey has developed further and further away from Europe,” Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz claimed ahead of the ministers’ meeting.
“This Turkey has no place in the EU,” he said.
“I am not in favour of continuing accession negotiations,” he added, expressing a view that has been gaining ground in some other member states.
Over the weekend, European Parliament President Martin Schulz suggested that the EU could impose economic sanctions on Turkey, rather than cutting off the talks.
He insisted that if Turkey would reintroduce the death penalty, which Erdogan seemed keen to do, the talks would end.
British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, whose country voted to leave the EU, said: “It’s very, very important that we should not push Turkey into a corner. We should not overreact.”
The EU issued a strong warning last week that Turkey is backsliding on key issues of rule of law and fundamental rights, with Brussels’ top official for membership negotiations questioning Ankara’s desire to join the bloc.
Turkey-EU relations were initially boosted through a migration deal under which Ankara is helping to reduce the number of migrants coming to Europe.
But Ankara has repeatedly threatened to walk away from the deal amid a row over visa-free EU travel concessions for Turkish citizens.
Meanwhile, Turkey has regularly stepped up anti-EU rhetoric, with Erdogan again accusing member states of supporting “terrorism”.
He alleges that countries like France allow the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to operate on their territory.
Member states fear a collapse of the migration deal could lead to a new surge in refugees and economic migrants after more than 1mn people reached the continent last year.
Erdogan’s suggestion of putting the EU bid up for referendum comes as he is anyway planning to hold a popular vote on a new constitution, which would empower his office.
In the months since the coup by a faction within the military, Turkey has arrested 10 members of parliament of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party, tens of thousands of civil servants have been fired and tens of thousands have been imprisoned.
Some 165 media outlets have been shuttered.
More than 100 journalists are in jail.
Last week, Turkey announced it was shuttering non-profit groups, including a children’s rights association and a lawyers group.