The painful process of opening the European Union to full membership for Turkey inched another agonising step forward yesterday, when the European Commission adopted a negotiating mandate for talks to begin on October 3. It was a decision taken with little apparent enthusiasm.

Poor Turkey. After 42 years in the waiting room, the timing of the start of formal negotiations could scarcely be worse. The mandate still has to be approved unanimously by the 25 member states before the talks begin, and after the shock of the Dutch and French referendum results on the EU constitution, that can no longer be taken for granted.