BERLIN, Oct. 26--Turkey was expected to insist on the unconditional backing of European Union powerhouses Germany and France for its bid to join the bloc at three-way talks, amid signs Paris is hedging its bets, AFP reported.
Following a one-day summit between Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, French President Jacques Chirac and Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, the leaders were to welcome Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Erdogan warned before leaving for Berlin that his poor, predominantly Muslim country would settle for nothing short of full membership in the EU, regardless of efforts within the bloc to slow the process.
"This summit... is very important with respect to our foreign policy objectives because Turkey's European Union accession process has ceased to be an ambiguous process for the EU and has taken an irreversible direction," Erdogan said in a speech before the parliamentary group of his Justice and Development Party.
Schroeder is a strong supporter of Turkey's bid, while Chirac has bowed to domestic pressure for a referendum on Ankara's accession and warned that Paris could veto membership talks at any time.
Erdogan urged France not to exploit Turkey's bid to join the EU for domestic political ends in a speech Thursday at the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
"What we have been trying to explain for months, above all else, is that holding a referendum (in an EU country) is not among the criteria for adhesion to the EU," he said.

PATTANI, Thailand, Oct. 26--At least 78 people were suffocated or crushed to death after being arrested and packed into police trucks after a riot in southern Thailand, AP quoted officials as saying Tuesday.
The announcement dramatically increased the death toll from the latest eruption of violence in Thailand's Muslim-dominated south to 84. Officials had earlier said that six people were shot to death during clashes Monday at a police station in Narathiwat province.
Dr. Pornthip Rojanasunan, a forensics expert who works for the Justice Ministry, told a news conference Tuesday that she and a team of doctors conducted autopsies on 78 bodies at an army camp in Pattani province and found that most of them had perished from suffocation.
The dead were among some 1,300 people arrested Monday following the police station riot. Maj. Gen. Sinchai Nujsathit, deputy commander of the fourth army, said the victims may have died from suffocation "because we had more than 1,300 people packed into the six-wheel trucks."
He did not say how many trucks were used.
Manit Suthaporn, deputy permanent secretary of the Justice Ministry, said the victims probably suffocated because they were piled on top of each other in the vehicles.
The violence erupted Monday when about 2,000 Muslim youths demonstrated outside a police station in Narathiwat's Takbai district to demand the release of six detained men.
Police and military forces tried to disperse the rowdy crowd with gunshots, water cannons and tear gas. Six people were killed and several injured in the melee, army commander Gen. Pisarn Wattanawongkhiri said Tuesday.

JAKARTA, Indonesia, Oct. 26--Indonesian prosecutors face sanctions unless they abide by a pledge to work honestly, President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said Tuesday as he continued efforts to battle corruption just days into his term of office, AFP reported.
Yudhoyono visited the attorney general's office to ask prosecutors to sign a pledge of professionalism, honesty, loyalty and hard work.
Legal observers say the attorney general's office, which is supposed to bring those guilty of corruption and other crimes to justice, is itself contaminated by prosecutors implicated in graft.
"For those who violate this contract, they will certainly face sanctions," said Yudhoyono.
He has already ordered his cabinet ministers and officials in the two top levels of government to sign a pledge to remain loyal, work hard, serve the people and not engage in corruption.
"If you have already been working professionally, well, and earnestly, I will certainly defend you all ... but if you are not serious, you will on the other hand, certainly receive sanctions," he warned.
The new president said the attorney general's office was an institution in which the people placed high hopes for law enforcement and justice.
"Good law enforcement and justice are two very important things for the success of this government," he said, adding that many crimes were now blamed on the failure of law enforcers, or their lack of capability and professionalism.
"Therefore, I came here to call on you all, law enforcers from the prosecutors' and attorney general's office and their ranks, to prove that we can do this," the president said.
Yudhoyono said his visit was also aimed at obtaining information about past and pending corruption cases.

STRASBOURG, France, Oct. 26--Incoming European Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso warned the European Parliament Tuesday against vetoing his new EU executive, saying a "no" vote would be a "bad day for Europe."
In an impassioned speech to the EU assembly ahead of a crunch vote Wednesday, he staunchly defended his decision to stand by controversial EU justice commissioner designate Rocco Buttiglione, AFP reported.
"I cannot surrender to a culture of intolerance," he said in a closing intervention to a three-hour debate at the parliament, which is expected to produce a knife-edge vote on the new Commission due to take office next week.
"If this Commission is not supported, frankly I believe it will be... a bad day for Europe," he said.
Socialists and others in the 732-member EU assembly have threatened to reject the incoming Commission in particular over Buttiglione, who has sparked a storm over comments on homosexuals and women.
The parliamentary arithmetic is too close to call. Only the conservative European People's Party, which holds 268 seats, backs the Barroso Commission. The views of the centrist Liberals are expected to be crucial to the outcome.
Barroso last week offered a compromise to MEPs that would remove sensitive powers to do with anti-discrimination from Buttiglione, by setting up a committee of fellow commissioners to decide on such issues.
"On the question of Mr Buttiglione's portfolio there is a division. Some want me to replace him. Others want me not to replace him. I have to find a balance," said Barroso.
"I think I have found the best solution, which is the one I've proposed to you," he told the EU assembly, warning that he could not cede to pressure to ditch Buttiglione.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, Oct. 26--Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has urged flexibility with India in their bitter dispute over Kashmir ahead of fresh talks expected next month, and again indicated a willingness to drop long-held demands, Reuters reported.
But in comments to Pakistani journalists on Monday, Musharraf stopped short of any concrete concession that could bring a dramatic breakthrough while holding out for a major policy shift from India that was unlikely any time soon, analysts said.
Musharraf called for debate on options to resolve the dispute over the divided Himalayan region that has bedeviled relations with India for more than 50 years and caused two of the nuclear-armed neighbors' three wars.
He reiterated that Pakistan was willing to drop a long-held demand for a referendum to decide the future of Kashmir.
He also called for debate on demilitarizing Kashmir's seven regions, two of which are in Pakistan, and suggested there then could be talks on Kashmir's status as a whole, or some of its regions with options ranging from joint control to independence.
But, at the same time, he was angling for major concessions that India was unlikely to countenance, analysts said.
"Most of these proposals touch on the Indian side of Kashmir," Samina Ahmed, Pakistan analyst of the Brussels-based International Crisis Group think-tank, said on Tuesday.
"At this point of time I would be taken aback if the Indians respond positively," she said. "That will require a major shift in India's stand on Kashmir."
Khalid Mehmood, senior researcher at Islamabad's Institute of Regional
Studies, said Musharraf had tried to show he was willing to be flexible, provided this was reciprocated. "But we need to see what demilitarization means." he said.