By Jean Christou
THE TURKISH Cypriot ‘parliament’ met yesterday behind closed doors ahead of a crucial vote on Friday on whether to take the UN plan for a Cyprus solution to referendum.
The meeting was being held in occupied Nicosia as Brussels brought pressure on Ankara by saying that the accession of a divided Cyprus would affects its chances of starting negotiations with the EU in 2005.
UN Secretary-general Kofi Annan has asked the Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders to travel to The Hague on Monday to give him an answer on whether they are willing to hold separate referendums on March 30 on the third version of his plan. Greece and Turkey will also be obliged to sign the document committing each side to holding referendums.
Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash is opposed to holding a referendum because he said his people do not understand the full implications of the Annan plan, and also because agreeing to a referendum implies agreement to the plan itself. He said if the plan were to be submitted to the people it would have to be accepted first.
Reports from the north yesterday suggested that four out of the five Turkish Cypriot parties would support the holding of a referendum. Only the ruling centre-right National Unity Party (UBP) of ‘prime minister’ Dervis Eroglu is opposed to it.
However the reports said that several members of the UBP had expressed support for a referendum, despite the opposition of their leadership and of Denktash. The UBP holds 24 of the 48 seats in ‘parliament’, so it would take very little UBP support to carry the vote in favour of a referendum.
Ordinary Turkish Cypriots also want the chance to vote in a referendum and have been staging demonstrations in the north to press Denktash to sign or quit. Yesterday around 2,500 people gathered outside ‘parliament’ to demonstrate in favour.
Denktash, who will travel to Ankara today, said the Turkish government was obliged to support the signature Annan wanted from the Turkish Cypriot side. “Will Turkey go to The Hague and sign? Can it sign?” he asked, adding that pressure was being exerted by the UN. “This much pressure and rush is unbelievable,” he was quoted as saying yesterday.
He said he had written a letter to Annan asking whether he wanted the two leaders to go to The Hague irrespective of their answers. “There is no meaning in going to The Hague in order to say ‘no’ to conducting a referendum on March 30,” he added.
Government spokesman Kypros Chrysostomides said yesterday that the National Council is unlikely to take a final decision when it meets today.
He said a meeting yesterday afternoon between President Tassos Papadopoulos, who will travel to Athens tomorrow, and UN special envoy Alvaro de Soto aimed at “investigating the possibility of further negotiating issues regarding the UN plan’s functionality”.
He said the President’s visit to Greece would be a continuation of last week’s talks in the Greek capital between Papadopoulos and Greek Prime Minister Costas Simitis.
“I am certain that there will be a complete discussion of all the issues. In any case, our accession course has been officially declared by the EU and by the Greek government… it is a simultaneous procedure completely independent from a Cyprus settlement”, he added.
Former President Glafcos Clerides has also been invited to participate in today’s National Council meeting, Chrysostomides said.
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
