German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder defended Friday his call for Turkey to be offered European Union membership, telling a Berlin conference this would create a bridge to the Moslem world. According to the text released in advance of his speech, he said Turkey would thus become an example to other nearby Islamic nations. "A democratic Turkey committed to European values would be clear proof that there is no contradiction between Islamic faith and an enlightened, modern society," he said, with new E.U. Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso next to him. "Entry by Turkey is rightly bound up with the hope for peace and security, and resonates far beyond Europe," said the chancellor. The issue has grown more controversial in the past week in Germany, where conservatives have stepped up criticism of both the E.U. invitation and of Turkish immigrants, saying they are incapable of integrating and are developing into a "parallel society". Barroso told the two-day conference on the European "soul" that European unity could only succeed if the potential offered by culture was used to the full. He said an example of what he meant was a student exchange programme code-named Erasmus that had allowed 1 million students so far to spend time abroad. ---SP 2224 Local Time 1924 GMT
