TURKISH Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash yesterday warned the European Union it would wreck peace efforts on the island if it admitted Cyprus, a front-running candidate for membership, without a settlement.
Denktash and President Glafcos Clerides have been engaged in slow-moving UN-backed peace talks aimed at reuniting Cyprus before the EU gives the island an accession date at a December summit.
“In the event the EU accepts the Greek Cypriot side in the name of Cyprus, there will be nothing left to discuss,” Denktash was quoted as telling reporters by the Turkish Cypriot news agency TAK.
“They will have resolved (the issue) at its roots. A Cyprus divided in two: one a member, the other one not,” he said.
The quagmire threatens to pitch Europe into crisis.
Turkey has signalled it could annex the occupied areas if Cyprus enters the EU without a settlement and EU member Greece has said it would veto the bloc’s enlargement if Cyprus is not included in the first wave.
Brussels has said it will accept Cyprus, divided or not, as early as 2004.
“If the EU unilaterally takes in the Greek Cypriots, it will have taken on trouble. But we will not be responsible for this,” Denktash said.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan is to meet Denktash and Clerides in Paris in September in an apparent bid to bring the seemingly intractable sides closer. The Security Council and EU have repeatedly criticised Denktash for the slow pace of the talks.
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.
