At the European Council held on the 17^th December 2004, European leaders agreed that Turkey fulfilled the Copenhagen political criteria and decided to officially start the accession negotiations with Turkey on the 3^rd October 2005. The Council’s decision to start accession negotiations was a critical turning point for the Turkey-EU relations. Therefore, final stage of EU membership process for Turkey has started.

Screening process or analytical examination of the acquis is a preparatory phase of accession negotiations. The screening process is carried out jointly by the Commission and each of the candidate countries. This process allows the latter to familiarise themselves with the acquis and, subsequently, to indicate their level of alignment with EU legislation and outline plans for further alignment. The European Commission started the screening process for Turkey on the 20^th October 2005 and the process was completed on the 13^th October 2006 as agreed by the parties.

For each negotiation chapter, meetings first for the explanatory screenings and then for the bilateral screening were held. In the process of explanatory screening, the European Commission informed Turkish authorities on the related chapter of the EU acquis. In bilateral screening process, the European Commission focused on the following issues:

• Is the candidate country able to adopt the relevant EU acquis?
• Did the candidate country adopt national legislation in line with the EU acquis? If not, what is the indicative agenda of the candidate country?
• Is there an effective administrative capacity for implementing the EU acquis in the relevant negotiation chapter? If not, when it is going to be established?
•  Is there a requirement for a transitional period regarding the relevant negotiation chapter? (Preliminary information regarding transitional periods is not binding in the screening process since these periods are agreed in the Position Papers).

Screening meetings for Turkey started with the Chapter on Science and Research and ended with the Chapter on Judiciary and Fundamental Rights. The dates for explanatory and bilateral screening meetings are presented below: