Our foreign policy is one of wishful thinking and repetitive sloganeering

The main thrust of this hard-hitting and pragmatic editorial is contained in the final paragraph and some of those who grace these comments’ columns will doubtless ignore it and accuse the paper and those of us who agree with it of being defeatist, unpatriotic and pro-Turk.

The bottom line is that the foreign policy as pursued by the Greek Cypriot side is one of wishful thinking, repetitive sloganeering and desperation borne of being in a vulnerable and extremely weak bargaining position. These trilateral bun fights with the likes of Egypt’s military strongman, Sisi, and Israel’s Netanyahu are merely photo shoots for the benefit of the Cypriot political establishment to give the impression domestically that they’re more important than they actually are.

As for the EU and America, they utter encouraging platitudes of solidarity to the GCs but in practical terms they’ll never do anything to stop Turkish drilling ‘safaris’. As it is, the world is awash with gas and oil and there’s now a new world energy order as a result of the recession created by COVID-19 so hydrocarbon exploration is hardly a priority.

The only way to break the logjam is for serious and meaningful dialogue in a spirit of compromise to take place between the four interested parties: GCs, TCs, Greeks and Turks. Anything else is sheer window dressing. As some of us have stated on numerous occasions, the wretched problem will soon be settled in any case with the death of the last of the original refugees. That won’t be long in coming and for all intents and purposes that really WILL be game over.

Fr

https://cyprus-mail.com/2020/06/21/our-view-pragmatic-foreign-policy-should-be-about-achieving-goals/

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.