Cablegate: Sept Codex Meeting in Japan - Turkish Input

This record is a partial extract of the original cable. The full text of the original cable is not available.

150504Z Aug 05

UNCLAS ANKARA 004774

SIPDIS

STATE FOR EB/JACK BOBO
USDA FOR FAS/BIG/DAWN WILLIAMS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: TBIO EAGR ECON TU
SUBJECT: Sept Codex Meeting in Japan - Turkish Input

Ref: State 147159

1. On August 12, AgCounselor met with Dr. Fatih Yildiz from
Middle East Technical University in Ankara. Dr. Fatih is
member of the faculty on food engineering and will be
Turkey's representative at the Codex Ad Hoc
Intergovernmental Task Force on Foods Derived from
Biotechnology (Task Force) in Chiba, Japan September 19-23,
2005.

2. Dr. Yildiz who spent 14 years in the United States at
several universities is also a member of Turkey's Codex
Committee. This committee has 7 members including 5 from
the Ministry of Agriculture and 5 from the Ministry of
Health. Dr. Yildiz represents the Ministry of Health on the
committee.

3. According to Dr. Yildiz, Turkey has not yet formalized
its position for the meetings in September. On August 22,
he will convene a meeting with all interested parties in
Ankara to discuss the topic. Post will try to get a summary
of that meeting to send to Washington.

4. Dr. Yildiz did mention that Turkey has been trying to
align its regulations with those of the European Union. He
stopped short in saying that Turkey would support only EU
proposals and he would try to provide us with comments on
the U.S. position as soon as possible. Dr. Yildiz mentioned
that Turkey supported the nomination of Dr. Karen L. Hulebek
as chair of the Codex Ad Hoc committee.

MCELDOWNEY

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