Coelho supports Turkey's EU membership

Portuguese Prime Minister Pedro Passos Coelho said in Ankara yesterday that Portugal had a lot to learn from Turkey's experiences in economic crises. Speaking at the Turkish-Portuguese Business Forum, Coelho said they wanted to renew relations between the two countries with clean slate and invited Turkish businesspeople to invest in Portugal. "Portugal has backed away from the edge of a cliff now and there are a lot of lessons to learn from Turkey's previous experiences," Coelho said, emphasizing the importance of steps taken from this point on and noting the similarities between the recent crisis in Portugal and the 2001 economic crisis in Turkey. Coelho also reiterated Portugal's support for Turkey's EU membership. For his part, Turkey's Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan said that Turkey would like to further improve its relations with Portugal and cooperate with the third countries by jointly benefiting from the advantages that Turkey mutually shares with Portugal. Caglayan also invited business circles in Portugal to especially focus on Turkey.