THE GOVERNMENT has submitted new proposals to aid the Turkish Cypriot side economically and is waiting for the EU’s views on the package, spokesman Christodoulos Pashiardis said yesterday.
The new proposals are designed to deflect EU attention from the Turkish Cypriot side’s demand for direct trade with the bloc, a move being discussed in Brussels under the German EU presidency.
Nicosia believes direct trade would constitute a political upgrade of the breakaway Turkish Cypriot state and is attempting to prove Turkish Cypriots are not isolated economically as they can have recourse to trade under the umbrella of the Cyprus Republic.
Direct trade in itself would lead to cementing partition as the Turkish Cypriots would no longer feel it necessary to seek a comprehensive settlement on reunifying the island.
“The aim of the Turkish side is the political upgrading of the illegal regime,” Pashiardis said. “The talk on the so-called isolation of Turkish Cypriots is merely a long-drawn Turkish song and its audience is gradually decreasing”.
Pashiardis said it was too soon to make public the proposals, which were submitted by Foreign Minister George Lillikas at the weekend on the sidelines of the Informal EU Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Bremen.
The spokesman said some of the measures might be implemented unilaterally by the government, and that it was up to the Turkish Cypriots to avail of them.
Lillikas told a news conference in Bremen on Saturday that it seemed the EU saw the proposals in a positive light but said time would be needed to examine them.
“We believe… the reunification of Cyprus can be achieved through economic integration, which means developing contacts, cooperation and common interests between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots,” Lillikas said.
President Tassos Papadopoulos said on Sunday the government was constantly working to achieve close cooperation with the Turkish Cypriots and in helping them improve their economic situation.
He said the international community was realising that the Turkish claims of isolation were “merely a myth” which aims at political, not economic upgrading.
