By Jean Christou
IT HAS BEEN SAID more than once that when it comes to the Cyprus conflict, Greek Cypriots have rather short memories and Turkish Cypriots rather long ones. Seven months away from the new millennium and the two sides are still counting backwards – although one side continues to count further back than the other.
For the Turkish Cypriots the Cyprus problem began not with the 1974 invasion but ten years earlier with the outbreak of the intercommunal troubles, and they don’t intend to let anyone forget it.
Interviews with any veteran Turkish Cypriot politician invariably turn into an examination of the past as practically every question is answered by a reference to the events of long ago. Dr Dervis Eroglu is no exception.
Eroglu, 61, ‘Prime Minister’ of the breakaway ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus’ returned to power last December when his party won 40.33 per cent of the vote.
Formerly in coalition with Serdar Denktash, son of the Turkish Cypriot leader, Eroglu’s National Unity Party this time around has hooked up with the less hard-line Communal Liberation Party of Mustafa Akinci.
“The coalition is going well and we envisage the strengthening of the TRNC so it can take its place among the international community,” Eroglu told The Sunday Mailin an exclusive interview.
But the only future he is willing to discuss is the one in which the breakaway regime is declared a state, the long-sought ‘Holy Grail’ for Turkish Cypriot leader and ‘TRNC President’ Rauf Denktash.
Recent talk of a ‘big push’ by the international community to get the two sides back to the negotiating table later this year failed to impress Eroglu: “There are such reports but we know of no such thing. It has been said that the G8 group will be taking the initiative and we are against it of course. It’s not something we look on positively that the international community takes the initiative on the Cyprus problem,” he said from his office in the Turkish-controlled part of Nicosia.
“As in the past we are surprised where the optimism is coming from. We are the people living on the island and we are the ones who understand the problem as parties to the dispute. We feel that only the people living here can solve the dispute.”
But is that not what diplomats have been trying to get across for years? Yes, but there’s a catch. “This can only be done with the acceptance of a two-state basis on the island if each side will accept and digest the acceptance of the other. This is the process that should continue and we should not expect anything from transatlantic initiatives to come and solve
it for us. We will solve it. Ever since Russia tried to internationalise the Cyprus problem, pull it into the direction of the international community, we are against it.”
Eroglu said the Turkish side has already made its position clear – that negotiations can only begin between two states on the island and be followed up under United Nations auspices. Even though the Turkish Cypriots would then have achieved their ultimate goal – recognition – there would still be many things to talk about, Eroglu believes.
“Issues between the two states and how they could be improved. Relations between the two states how they could be improved,” he cited as examples. Perhaps even a possible confederation, an idea totally opposed by the Greek Cypriots, could be on the agenda, he added.
“First of all the two sides have to live in good neighbourly relations and this is the basis,” he said. “We have established our state and it’s a reality even if it is only recognised by Turkey. Cyprus is a small island but certainly it can keep two states. After seeing the tragedies in Bosnia and Kosovo it should be clear to all that the two states on the island should live in peace and good neighbourly relations.”
Eroglu does not believe Greeks and Turks can live in good neighbourly relations in a bi-
communal bizonal federation, even though that it is the sought-after solution by the international community, and is grudgingly accepted by the Greek Cypriots in a better-than-nothing kind of way.
Eroglu predicts that a federation, if it were imposed now by the international community, would take Cyprus back 30 years and no amount of persuading that the cosmopolitan Cyprus of 1999 is not the Enosis-mad (union with Greece) island it was in 1974, can change his mind.
“If such a thing (federation) were imposed the situation would revert to the pre-1974 period, and in fact it could just be like Kosovo and Bosnia,” Eroglu said. ” When blood is being shed in other parts of the world why is it that they are always trying to push the situation in Cyprus to breaking point?”
To prove his assertion that the last thing the Greek Cypriots want is to live with their Turkish counterparts, Eroglu cited a 1967 resolution by the House of Representatives on Enosis.
“It is still there. They haven’t revoked it,” he said. “And the fact that it is still there as a resolution means it carries weight. It is important in the sense that it shows the will and the wish of the Greek Cypriot side, not that it could be practically applied. It is still there and we take it seriously.”
Going even further back in time, Eroglu cites a United Nations decision of March 4, 1964 – recognising Greek Cypriots as the government of Cyprus – as being a major part of the problem.
“Greek Cypriots have tried to take away everything from us… and have taken continuously from us so at present we don’t owe them anything. On the contrary what we have done is to protect our rights which were taken from us,” he said.
“That is precisely the problem. The recognition of the Greek Cypriot side by the rest of the world as the government of the whole of Cyprus. It is usurper of the false title of the government of the republic of Cyprus.”
The fact that Greek Cypriots hold the title of internationally recognised government of Cyprus means, for Eroglu and the Turkish Cypriots, that the Greek side really has no incentive to negotiate for a federal solution.
“Greek Cypriots don’t want a federal solution. This is the main problem in Cyprus. Unless we are recognised as a state as equals to the Greek Cypriots we will not sit and negotiate, ” he said.
“The second biggest problem is the European Union. Instead of encouraging a solution on the island it accepted the Greek Cypriot side as the government of the whole of Cyprus and in the name of that the whole of Cyprus could join the European Union. These are the major problems preventing a solution on the island.”
The Turkish Cypriot side has continually refused to join the Cyprus Republic EU negotiating team, although it has been officially invited. The Turkish side has, in the past, gone as far as to suggest that Cyprus joining the EU, of which Greece is also a member, is in fact the fulfilment of Enosis.
Logically, then, this would also mean the Enosisof Cyprus with 14 other EU member states and of those countries with each other. Turkey, with its own dearly held wish to join the bloc, would also be a party to Enosisif it were to gain EU membership.
But Eroglu rejects the notion of using the EU accession process as a platform to secure Turkish Cypriot rights in a federal Cyprus, preferring, it would appear, to stay out in the cold hoping for the day recognition will magically appear. It all comes back again to the status of the ‘TRNC’ like a ‘Catch-22′ conundrum. No negotiations, no recognition: no recognition, no negotiations.
“What will be our status when we join the negotiations?” asked Eroglu, referring to the reason why the Turkish Cypriots do not wish to participate in a club which can only bring them prosperity, status and security.
“The moment we join the Greek Cypriot team we would be accepting the Greek Cypriots as the government of the whole of Cyprus, and the problem in a sense would end with us being a minority on the island,” he said.
The EU’s decision in December 1997 to go ahead with Cyprus’ accession while giving the cold shoulder to Turkey prompted a strong reaction from the Turkish Cypriot side. This included slapping a ban on bicommunal contacts, which is still in place 18 months later.
The international community wants both sides to come to the negotiating table without preconditions and has hinted to the Turkish side that recognition is something which should come at the end of negotiations, not at the beginning.
Indeed under UN negotiations both leaders are merely representatives of their respective communities. But this is not enough for the Turkish side either.
“When you have on one side a state and on the other you have a community, when these two sides come to sit at the negotiating table nothing will come of it…just minority rights,” Eroglu said.
“The idea of two equal sides sitting at the table of the United Nations is nothing but cosmetic. When (President Glafcos) Clerides is out of the room he can go as a president of a state to different countries and meet people as president and our side cannot not do that.”
Clerides’ last-minute cancellation, under international pressure, of the controversial Russian S-300 missiles – which Turkey threatened to attack if they were deployed – is not seen by the Turkish Cypriots as a sign of willingness on the part of the Greek Cypriot side to negotiate.
“We don’t see it as a sign of goodwill because it was the Greek Cypriots who signed the deal to bring them. Clerides, even before he was elected, brought up this missile issue,” Eroglu said. “And then of course he followed it up later. Then he faced increasing pressure and when the time came he tried to find a reason to cancel it. The impression that you got was that Clerides was trying to strengthen his hand at the negotiating table.”
It appears that unless the US, Britain, the EU and the G8 know something the Turkish Cypriot ‘Prime Minister’ does not about a possible return to negotiations later this year, hopes for face-to-face talks have two chances of coming about – slim and nil – especially if Rauf Denktash’s feelings mirror those of Eroglu.
Eroglu thinks the idea of a federation between Greek and Turkish Cypriots is something which should be left to the next generation, and if that means being left out in the cold for the moment then so be it.
“What we are doing is trying to strengthen our republic and achieve further recognition and at the moment this is what we intend to do. We have no other alternative,” he said.
“We are not just waiting for them (Greek Cypriots) to come to the negotiating table. We are strengthening our economy and will move forward into international relations and then of course take our place among the international community.”
If the longed-for recognition does not come and the Cyprus Republic joins the EU without a solution, will the ‘TRNC’ become a Turkish colony?
“A settlement of the Cyprus problem will be on the agenda in the next five to ten years but the reality of two states will continue as well,” Eroglu said. And if recognition does come would the Turkish side ‘run’ with it, as feared by the Greek Cypriots?
“Even if we grab it where will we go?” Eroglu said. “We have no intention of doing that – of taking it and then moving closer to Turkey. We wish to live on the island as an independent state.”
