"The Czech Republic is convinced that one day, Turkey should be a member of the EU," he told reporters in Prague.

"But I have to stress that, lamentably, prejudices in western Europe are existing... against the Turks," Schwarzenberg was quoted by AFP as saying.

"We should work in the EU ourselves to get rid of these prejudices," added Schwarzenberg, whose country assumed the rotating EU presidency at the start of the year.

Many of the "old" EU nations, France in particular as well as Austria and to a lesser extent Germany, are among the most hostile to Turkey joining the European bloc.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has said Turkey has no place in the EU, has vetoed the opening of five of the 35 policy chapters which Turkey must successfully negotiate prior to membership.

While Turkey is "of strategic importance to Europe" it has to accept all the conditions to become a European state and fulfill the criteria, said Schwarzenberg, admitting that was likely some way off.

"The reform process in Turkey in the last years lost a bit of energy, there are some problems to solve," Schwarzenberg said.

Turkey began accession talks in 2005 but has made slow progress due to what analysts attribute to domestic politics, lack of enthusiasm for the bloc at home and a lack of appetite for further enlargement among EU states.