No customs union, no EU talks

IF TURKEY does not sign the protocol adapting the Ankara Agreement to extend to all 10 new members of the European Union, it cannot begin accession negotiations, President Tassos Papadopoulos said yesterday.

He also pointed out that the EU sets out the conditions a candidate country must meet and that it is up to that country to meet them.

“Turkey has applied for EU membership and if it does not comply with the terms laid down, accession talks will not start,” Papadopoulos said.

His comments were in response to statements by Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan that Ankara has not signed the conclusions of the EU summit, which he said were unilateral decisions and that therefore Turkey was not obliged to sign the protocol extending its customs union agreement to all 10 new members, including Cyprus, which Ankara does not recognise.

“If Ankara wants, it will not sign the protocol. If it does not sign it, it will not start membership talks,” Papadopoulos reiterated.

On prospects for a fresh effort to solve the Cyprus problem, he said he was neither optimistic nor pessimistic.

“We have to know the agenda and the issues that will be discussed with regard to the talks in order to create the right conditions for the resumption of talks. We also need to know if these talks will be open and free or whether they will be subject to arbitration,” he said, adding that the government continued to examine various issues with the UN and hoped that the conditions for talks will be created.

He expressed the conviction that the preconditions for a viable and functional solution existed but added, “it takes two to reach an agreement”.

Responding to questions, he said proposals and counterproposals as well as compromises were made at any negotiations.

“If we want a solution we shall make compromises, but others should do the same as well,” he said.

Papadopoulos described as “naive and unrealistic” the view that the Greek Cypriot side must spell out the limits of its concessions.

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.