THERE WAS more fallout yesterday over the assertion by the Director of the President’s Diplomatic Office Tasos Tzionis that the Cyprus problem cannot be resolved on the basis of the Annan plan.
Coming from the President’s chief aide, the comments sparked a backlash among political quarters: ever since it was submitted 18 months ago, the UN blueprint has been regarded as the starting point for any future negotiations to reunify the island. It is a policy endorsed by the National Council and consistently reiterated by the government.
In an interview with Phileleftheros published at the weekend, Tzionis said “it would be a mistake to return to a process to solve the Cyprus problem… [that is] based on a document that was rejected politically and legally by the people and that will bring back to the surface negative moments in their collective memory.”
Tzionis said that if the solution were pursued on the basis of the Annan plan then the deadlock or political bartering that would follow would “trap” Greek Cypriots in a process that could lead to no solution.
He went on to add these were his personal opinions and that he was not speaking in his capacity as a diplomat.
In addition to putting the government on the spot, Tzionis incurred the wrath of senior coalition partners AKEL. The communist party reacted to his remark that “you’d have expected only those who wish to bring back the Annan plan with cosmetic changes to disagree.”
The insinuation was that AKEL, which publicly declares it wants substantial changes to the blueprint, was being insincere.
During last year’s referenda, the party stood opposed to the UN-sponsored plan, but offered an enigmatic explanation for its stance:
“We are saying ‘no’ to cement the ‘yes’,” it said at the time.
However, speculation has since raged over whether in private the top party brass wanted to support the plan but balked at the prospect of creating a major rift with the President.
“We won’t take any lessons in patriotism or on how to handle the Cyprus issue from Mr. Tzionis,” AKEL spokesman Andros Kyprianou said yesterday.
“Besides, who told him that negotiations work that way at all? According to him, each paragraph of the plan would be negotiated, then accepted or rejected by one or both sides.
That’s not how it works.”
For its part, the administration continued playing down the incident, saying that, just as with all citizens, Tzionis was entitled to his personal opinion.
Asked whether the potentially embarrassing comments might put Tzionis’ job in jeopardy, government spokesman Kypros Chrysostomides replied:
“No…this matter is considered closed for the government,” he said.
Ruling DIKO and socialist EDEK similarly strove to trivialise the matter. But Demetris Syllouris, head of the fledgling European Party, indirectly accused AKEL of hypocrisy:
