CYPRUS WAS not informed of the European Commission’s decision to revisit the dormant regulation proposal on direct trade between the EU and the north, said President Demetris Christofias yesterday.
Speaking during a joint press conference with visiting Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou, Christofias said the Commission “seized the opportunity” to raise the issue of direct trade again, following the approval of the Lisbon Treaty, which gives the European Parliament (EP) co-decision powers in new areas.
Since 2004, when the EU promised to open direct trade with the Turkish Cypriots in reward for their “yes” vote on the Annan plan, Cyprus and Greece have been working together to postpone approval of the regulation at the European Council, said the president.
“Unfortunately, the issue has not been erased from the Commission’s agenda,” he said, noting that it sent the regulation proposal, along with other pending issues, to the EP for examination.
“With all due respect to the Commission, it did not do something that should be done. While in December, it put all these issues on the internal website of the EU, we, as the interested member state, were not informed. Neither was Greece.
“In March, it became known that this was on the agenda of the International Trade Committee of the EP. Our position is that this is also a mistake. Cyprus is a member of the EU and this is not the committee that should be discussing this,” he said.
Christofias said Cyprus and Greece were cooperating closely “to deal with this, let me say, provocation. To me, it is a provocation. And I believe we can deal with it”.
Cyprus has long questioned the legal basis of the Commission’s proposal for direct trade. It maintains it has a veto on the matter, arguing that direct trade with the north is not a question of international trade, as it comes under the de jure control of the Republic of Cyprus, as stipulated in Protocol 10 of the Accession Treaty.
The Commission has another view, and if Parliament concurs, then the matter will go to the Council for a vote based on qualified majority voting.
“I believe that we will once again be able to prevent this attempt made by the Commission. I have complained to the Commission President, representations have been made, the relevant letters are being prepared, to explain the substance of the issue, and that the so-called direct trade should not be linked to Turkey’s obligations towards Cyprus, as they extend also to the EU, and as set out in the Ankara Protocol,” said Christofias.
Foreign Minister Marcos Kyprianou yesterday met with five of the six Cypriot Members of the EP (MEPs) to discuss the direct trade issue. DISY MEP Ioannis Kasoulides was absent.
According to DIKO MEP Antigoni Papadopoulos, the minister discussed how to improve coordination against the proposed regulation. She called on people to avoid playing the blame game over why Cyprus found out so late in the day about the Commission’s efforts to resurrect the direct trade regulation.
“What I see in Cyprus is people speaking too much. We shouldn’t play the blame game. The EU needs a lot of work. We need a strategy to deal with this, and not just talk about who called who first or second or whenever,” said Papadopoulos.
According to reports, the Foreign Ministry has launched an investigation into how Cyprus’ Permanent Representation in Brussels was caught unawares about the Commission’s latest moves on direct trade.
One paper has suggested that the Representation was informed of the issue but failed to pass it on to the ministry in Nicosia. DISY spokesman Haris Georgiades said yesterday: “The fact that the government, or at least government departments, knew about it since last December provokes sadness and concern. We lost precious time and the effort to prevent these movements is made much more difficult.”
Christofias effectively backed his diplomats in Brussels with yesterday’s comments, saying the Commission had failed to brief the very government which is directly involved in the issue.
One Brussels source told the Cyprus Mail that an informative document was sent out on December 2, 2009, including a general list of pending issues, within which was the direct trade regulation. This was not officially submitted to member states or flagged as important by the Council as often happens with key documents but simply distributed automatically as a “general policy” document.
On March 1, 2010, the Commission officially used its legal initiative to submit proposals to the EP, including one on direct trade. The Cyprus Representation was not informed of this either formally or through dialogue with Commission officials.
Given the immense load of documents posted daily by EU institutions on a general basis, it remains to be seen whether new mechanisms will have to be found for smaller representations like that of Cyprus to ensure full coverage of even seemingly benign documents.
