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Reuniting Cyprus: what if the next talks fail? | Europe News

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Athens, Greece – Following talks led by the United Nations in April that failed to revive negotiations on Cyprus’s reunification, Turkish Foreign Minister Cyprus told Al Jazeera that the UN process is dead.

“There will be no negotiations as long as Greek Cypriots are treated as if they were the Republic of Cyprus and Turkish Cypriots are treated as if they are just a mere community in that Republic,” Tahsin Ertugruloglu told Al. Jazeera.

“Equal international status is mandatory.”

The Cypriot Turks declared the Republic of North Cyprus a Turkey in 1983, and gave it the formal title of Republic of Turkey (TRNC), but the UN Security Council immediately denounced it as “invalid” and “incompatible with the 1960 Treaty”. ‘Independence from Britain.

As a result, only Turkey recognizes it.

The internationally recognized Greek Republic of Cyprus is inhabited.

UN resolutions have called on both sides to form a two-zone and two-community federation.

Turkish-Cypriot President Ersin Tatar came to power last October after failing to hold UN talks and promised a two-state solution.

However, the federation was originally the idea of ​​the Turkish Cypriots, who were declared federated states in 1975, a few months after the Greek coup attempt in Nicosia led to the Turkish invasion.

Turkey still occupies the northern third of the island, saying it must protect its ethnic minority.

Inter-communal clashes had already separated the two communities in 1964.

“We created the Turkish Cypriot federation in the hope that the Greek Cypriots would establish their own federated state,” Ertugruloglu said.

“But the Greek Cypriots have no reason to accept this kind of agreement, because the world accepts them as a Republic of Cyprus on their own, and thus is able to enjoy the benefits of their self-recognition … Why should they ever accept anything less than that?”

Greek Cypriots have been in talks for a federal solution for 30 years. In 2004, the European Union approved the entire island, but suspended EU legislation in the north pending a solution.

Ertugruloglu rejects the idea that the TRNC is part of the EU.

Half of the citizens, however, have Cypriot passports.

“Individual Turkish-Cypriots have been able to secure passports and identity documents from Greek Cypriots, but that does not mean that [they] recognize the Greek-Cypriot as a state, ”he said.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said he will try to bring Greek and Turkish Cypriots to the table in a few months. Ertugruloglu says he will go.

“As a result, we will determine the way forward for our mother along with Turkey,” he said.

‘We are very close’

Four years ago Guterres wrote in a report that the deal was closer than ever.

“The essence of a comprehensive solution to the Cyprus problem is almost there. The parties approached a strategic understanding of security and security, as well as all other key elements of a comprehensive solution,” Guterres wrote to the UN Security Council after recent negotiations at the Swiss Crans station. Montana 2017.

A senior diplomat with in-depth knowledge of the talks said that “the open issues that remain in Crans Montana are small.”

“We are very close,” the diplomat told Al Jazeera, on condition of anonymity. “Everything the Turkish side does is elusive because they want to avoid a solution.”

According to the diplomat, Turkey has “hijacked” the Council of Europe’s economic concessions this month with the Cyprus agreement.

“Turkey will get some concessions on immigration and maybe a conditional statement that the whole customs union will be examined when the conditions allow, but from then on they will get nothing.”

The Turkish lira fell in 2020 and 2021 as investors reflected concerns about rising unemployment, slowing growth and political uncertainty as the rift between Turkey and Western allies widened.

Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades has left open the possibility of vetoing unilateral EU concessions.

Guterres cannot override the Security Council’s order to seek a federal formula, a reality that Tatar and Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey believe is Ozdil Nami, Turkey’s former Cypriot foreign minister and chief negotiator.

“Turkey and our current president know very well that there is no country other than Turkey on an island that is willing to accept that the TRNC is an independent sovereign state, an island that has been fully accepted as a member of the European Union.” Namik told Al Jazeera.

“I think they wanted to present this extreme attitude of recognition to the TRNC a priori and negotiate and hope that someone, be it the Americans, be it the UN or the UK, will try to find a middle ground.”

He believes there should be deadlines for talks and consequences for the community that votes against the plan.

Where is the US?

The Greek Cypriots completely rejected it in 2004 when the Turkish Cypriots fully endorsed the UN plan, but that plan was not negotiated by either side.

Guterres told the Security Council that the process needs to change, from a bottom-up perspective to agreeing on smaller issues, to a top-down process – the most contentious.

“At the strategic level, an early agreement would immediately give each side the necessary calm, that the general settlement would contain elements of key importance to each community, and thus provide the impetus to complete the remaining technical details,” his report wrote.

It is basically a reference to the key security issue, where Cypriot actors have a say.

Under independence, Britain, Turkey and Greece have the right to intervene unilaterally on the island. Under this guarantee treaty, it was invaded by Turkey in 1974.

After becoming a member of the EU in 2004, Cyprus said guarantors were not necessary and a threat. These treaties are repealed and require the departure of foreign troops.

Turkey has stated that it is ready to change its guarantee rights but not to remove them.

“Not having any security ties with Turkey is considered a very dangerous scenario for the Turkish Cypriots,” Namik said, adding that they are only one-fifth of the population.

A strategic security agreement was “beginning to emerge” in Crans Montana, Guterres said.

The key concessions should be made by Turkey, which has an absolute military advantage.

“If Turkey – and Erdogan in particular – is offered the chance to become a champion of the Eastern Mediterranean peace process, and Erdogan is seen as a serious and serious counterpart who does not have to wait for the phone he calls again. .I think he will play ball, “Namik said.

The Joe Biden administration has shown that the US president is not ready to appease Erdogan; it took him four months to call the Turkish president.

His Secretary of State Antony Blinken has stressed the US’s support for a federal solution.

“It’s very important that the U.S. … emphasizes that conflicts can be resolved peacefully, diplomatically, not militarily, and certainly not through provocative actions,” Blinken told Congress in March.

Last month, the U.S. State Department said that “the level of cooperation between the United States and the Republic of Cyprus is historic.”

Since 2018, Cyprus has begun military exercises and training with the U.S., sent its first security annex to Washington, and has begun receiving U.S. troops and ships.

Turkey is also expanding its military presence.

Next month, Erdogan is expected to inaugurate a new airport for TB2 drones built in Turkey, capable of carrying bombs. Geopolitically, it seems that events are not moving towards the return of Erdogan to the West.

Should Turkey retain security concessions and a comprehensive agreement to get Cypriots to flee, what can happen?

Nami is not optimistic.

“Or formal annexation [to Turkey] or de facto northern Cyprus, which is Turkey, ”he said.



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