ANKARA - There are serious problems between the general positions of Turkey and the European Union, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Wednesday.
Speaking at a joint press conference with his visiting Romanian counterpart Teodor Baconschi in the Turkish capital of Ankara, Davutoglu said the problems were discussed transparently in Tuesday's EU-Turkey Association Council meeting in Brussel and Ankara requested the EU to make a strategic consideration on three issues.

"The negotiation process [with the EU] is at bottleneck despite all the efforts," he said. Citing the Cyprus dispute, which Turkey faces difficulty moving ahead through her EU bid since Ankara did not open her ports to Greek Cypriots, Davutoglu said that the problem in EU negotiations was not with the technical process, but with the political blockages "which should not be laid in front of Turkey."

Davutoglu also criticized EU's strict visa policy on Turkish nationals as "legally baseless and unfair."
He complained that the EU has yet to authorize the launching of negotiations over a visa- free travel regime for Turkish citizens, although Ankara had made successful progress in what EU demanded in return for the starting the visa exemption talks. (Xinhua)