CYPRUS will not forsake its vital national interests in return for entry into the European Union.
It should not demand that EU states issue a “blank cheque” that the Cyprus problem will not be an obstacle to entry.
But accession talks will start next April as agreed and Cyprus will be in the next phase of EU enlargement.
These are some of the main points to emerge from Foreign Minister Yiannakis Cassoulides’ meeting yesterday with the House Finance Committee.
Cassoulides – who was answering questions during the committee’s examination of his ministry’s budget for 1998 – said there were no plans to open new embassies next year.
Studies were under way to establish how the enlightenment campaign could prove more effective. The ministry has already decided to hire a third public relations firm in the United States, but to stop using such services in Europe, he said.
On the S-300 missiles, Cassoulides reiterated that the missiles would be deployed unless there was progress towards a settlement or agreement on demilitarisation. But he agreed with Edek’s Takis Hadjidemetriou’s suggestion that Cyprus should seek international support for a decision to buy weapons which are clearly defensive.
Most of yesterday’s three hour committee meeting focused on Cyprus’ bid for EU membership – an issue on which Cassoulides was explicit.
He said accession talks would start on schedule next April. They would not be difficult, but Cyprus would face as an obstacle the fact that the Cyprus problem remained unsolved. Its job was to convince the EU this was no fault of its own.
Accession talks could operate as a catalyst for a settlement by making Turkey realise Cyprus would be part of the next enlargement.
Cypriots must be realistic and take things step by step, rather than insist on a priori guarantees that partition would not prevent accession.
“The first important thing is for talks to start properly, to proceed well and to reach a positive conclusion. We must take it step by step. We cannot insist on a blank cheque,” he said.
But he said he had made clear to his EU counterparts Cyprus would not sacrifice vital national interests in order to join the EU. “I have made clear that we see accession as a way of helping a settlement, and would never agree to it if it were to make the partition permanent,” he said.
Cassoulides said working groups being co-ordinated by the Planning Bureau were preparing for the start of the accession talks – and for eventual membership.
“We will be ready for the accession talks. But as regards
adapting local legislation, priority will be given to those laws which do not entail any cost. Those that carry a cost will be left to last and on some issues we will be asking for exemptions or extensions,” he said.
