Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar and Greek Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides are meeting with the UN chief Tuesday, but recent history inspires doubt about their ability to resume the negotiations.
While Cyprus marked 50 years as a divided island, limited options remain between the Turkish and Greek
Cypriots to mitigate the situation. The UN, however, under the auspices of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, invited Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar and Greek Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides for a trilateral dinner in New York on Oct. 15, following UN envoy on Cyprus Maria Angela Holguin Cuellar’s appointment.
Located smack dab in the middle of the eastern basin of the Mediterranean, Cyprus has seen an influx of military deployments, refugee inflows and even Hezbollah threats hurled its way over the past year as the island rises in geographical significance.
Split for 50 years as of this July, the community is mostly composed of Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, divided largely by language, religion, ethnicity and a stark difference in standard of living. The island was severed in 1974 when Turkey staged a military intervention following a Greek-led coup aimed at uniting the island with Greece. To date, Ankara, Athens and London remain guarantor powers and negotiations have been deadlocked since 2017.
According to the TRNC’s official website, Tatar and Christodoulides last met in July 2023, paying a joint visit to the anthropological laboratory of the Committee on Missing Persons. Previously, they met under the auspices of the UN deputy special adviser on Cyprus, Colin Stewart, in February 2023 for an informal discussion. As major position differences remain, no major progress if any is expected from the meeting.
On the UN’s schedule, the international body referred to Tuesday’s meeting as an “informal dinner.” Tatar’s office said the dinner has no agenda, saying the “two leaders will exchange views in a social setting.” Speaking in early October at the Cyprus Forum, an NGO-organized conference on the Cyprus issue, Christodoulides said, “There is nothing that is open-ended. The discussion is taking place for one purpose only: to see if there are prospects for resuming talks.”
Before heading off for New York, Tatar reiterated his stance, which has landed him in the opposition party’s crosshairs, calling for a two-state solution. In contrast, a senior Greek Cypriot diplomatic source told Al-Monitor Nicosia rejects “any attempt to engage in any kind of discussion, under any circumstances, involving a two-state solution or sovereign equality.”
“This [dinner] is a positive development. It’s a step but there’s low expectations,” Nicolas Kyriakides, founder of the Cyprus Forum, told Al-Monitor, as the TRNC faces growing domestic displeasure leading to calls for an early election.
Both sides accuse the other of negotiating in bad faith, with the Turkish Cypriots believing they’ve paid a heavier price for failed talks as their 1983 independence remains recognized only by Ankara while the Greek Cypriots were granted a seat in the European Union. The 2004 Annan Plan referendum, on a UN plan to reunite the island, failed as 65% of Turkish Cypriots but only 24% of Greek Cypriots voted in favor.
A senior Greek Cypriot diplomatic source who believes that Ankara instead of the TRNC leadership makes the ultimate decisions, told Al-Monitor Nicosia remains committed to returning to the negotiations from July 2017, calling for a “bi-zonal, bi-communal federation.”
The negotiations collapsed in Crans Montana, Switzerland, in 2017 after a week of talks turned sour late in the night. At the time, Guterres declined to offer details on what caused the negotiations to collapse, saying only there was a wide gap on a number of questions amid both sides’ mutual recriminations.
Following the collapse, a spokesperson for the Greek Cypriot government said Turkey had refused to remove troops from the island and relinquish its intervention rights. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said the collapse showed the “impossibility of reaching a settlement” within the UN parameters.
As the talks stood at a standstill since 2017, the TRNC unveiled its two-state solution proposal following informal meetings in Geneva in April 2021.
Kyriakides said that there has been discussion in Turkish Cypriot circles to rearrange the architecture of negotiations to avoid a repeat of Crans-Montana, including consequences for any side that abandons the talks.
A senior Turkish Cypriot diplomatic source, meanwhile, expressed concern that the United Nations and the European Union are inclined to side with the Greek Cypriots as Nicosia is a member state, saying “the UN is not an impartial body.”
Cyprus’ ambassador to the United States, Evangelos Savva, publicly — and Greek Cypriot diplomats privately — told Al-Monitor that all previous negotiations were held up by Turkey’s military presence on the island. Savva told “War on the Rocks” that Turkey has 40,000 troops on the island. Ankara does not publish the number of Turkish troops on the island.
Turkish Cypriot diplomatic sources pointed out that foreign troops are in Greek Cyprus as well, with Nicosia signing defense cooperation agreements with Washington as the Biden administration lifted a 1980s arms embargo on the Republic of Cyprus in 2022. The move was condemned by Ankara, with Turkish efforts in Congress devoted to lobbying against it.
Washington extended that embargo lift in late September, effective Oct. 1, 2024, through Sept. 30, 2025. Greece and Turkey are NATO members while Cyprus is not.
When Al-Monitor asked the senior Greek Cypriot diplomatic source whether the status quo could simply go on indefinitely, given the island has peacefully lived divided since the 1970s, they said the international community never knows when violence could ensue. Under a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation, the source argued, Turkish Cypriots are guaranteed safety and a voice in the one-state federation, ensuring protection for all.
Turkish Cypriots, recalling the massacres of the 1960s and 1970s, cannot be sure of the Greek Cypriots’ assurances. Some have, therefore, argued that the presence of Turkish troops is necessary.
Island since Oct. 7
Since Hamas launched its bloody attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, leading to Israel’s subsequent war in Gaza, Cyprus’ geographical role in the region has come into focus. Cyprus, along with other partners, announced the opening of a maritime corridor in March to deliver humanitarian assistance by sea, otherwise known as the Amalthea Initiative, transporting goods from Larnaca to the now-defunct Pentagon-constructed port in Gaza. In an interview with the Anadolu Agency, Tatar expressed willingness to allow the usage of Famagusta’s port for humanitarian aid into Gaza.
Cyprus made headlines in June when late Hezbollah chief Nassan Nasrallah threatened to involve the island in the conflict if Nicosia opened its airports to Israel. Nicosia dismissed Hezbollah’s threats.
A few weeks later in June, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said that Cyprus was becoming an “operation center” in the Israel-Gaza war. The TRNC sides closely with Ankara, which has traded harsh words with the Israeli leadership.
In September, British and American troops were sent to the island amid calls for UK and US citizens to leave Lebanon.
Recognition
One senior Turkish Cypriot diplomatic source said that the TRNC should focus on increasing the number of countries that recognize its territory. Not all Turkish Cypriot diplomats appear to agree on that, as
another Turkish Cypriot diplomatic source cast chasing recognition as a fool’s errand. But concern was raised in Nicosia when Russian Ambassador to Cyprus Murat Zyazikov, despite dismissing allegations that Moscow could change its position, sat down for an interview with Greek Cypriot daily newspaper Simerini and used the terms “Turkish Cypriot side” and “north” instead of “occupied territory.”
Ties between Moscow and Nicosia have waned since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, as the Republic of Cyprus is a member of the European Union. Meanwhile, Ankara maintains relations with Moscow and Erdogan calls Putin a “dear friend,” aiming to increase bilateral trade and diplomatic cooperation in Syria.
Ankara has pushed for Moscow to increase its cooperation with the TRNC, as the AKP-aligned Daily
Sabah reported that Erdogan previously discussed starting direct flights from Russia to the TRNC in 2022.
In 2022, the TRNC was granted observer status in the Organization of Turkic States, an effort that Ankara advocated but drew the ire of the European Union. Brussels called the move an attempt to “legitimize the Turkish Cypriot secessionist entity.”
In 2023, Moscow opened a consular office in Northern Cyprus to serve its citizens living in the country, but stopped short of recognizing TRNC.
The United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Australia and Italy have “non-diplomatic” consular missions in the TRNC.
Original article here: https://www.al-monitor.com/originals/2024/10/crisis-crippling-region-long-divided-islands-leaders-meet-new-york