‘GCs turned down 15 proposals for a federal solution’
THE Greek Cypriot side has turned down 15 proposals for a federal solution in Cyprus, President Ersin Tatar told an audience at a conference in Antalya, Turkey.
President Tatar was speaking at the first annual Antalya Diplomacy Forum (ADF) held under the auspices of the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, which took place from June 18-20.
He was accompanied to the event by his special representative Ergün Olgun and TRNC Foreign Minister Tahsin Ertuğruloğlu.
In his speech, President Tatar highlighted the need for a “new vision” in Cyprus after years of failed negotiations.
A realistic, two-state settlement stance “will benefit both sides in Cyprus and all sides in the Eastern Mediterranean”, he argued.
After a moderator expressed that the international community has “sympathy” for Turkish Cypriots, Mr Tatar replied that Turkish Cypriots “do not want just sympathy”.
“There is a need to respect our human rights and ability to trade and travel directly [to other countries],” he said.
“There is a need to adopt a
‘thinking outside the box’ approach for a settlement in Cyprus that is based on a realistic model of two states that are in cooperation with one another in different fields, rather than continuing to negotiate on a basis that has failed time and time again over the past decades.”
Mr Erdoğan, as part of his speech to the ADF, said: “We support the two-state solution based on equal sovereignty put forward in Geneva by the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.
“We want the Mediterranean to be a region of peace, prosperity and cooperation. Our proposal to convene an Eastern Mediterranean Conference with the participation of all the stakeholders is still valid.
“It is up to us to determine whether the energy resources in the East Mediterranean will lead to confrontation or cooperation. We are pleased with the momentum we have recently achieved with our neighbour Greece.
“We also want to strengthen our cooperation with our ally the US and the EU through a positive agenda.”
Prof Joseph Bahout, head of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut, was asked how the “unresolved” issue of Cyprus ties into “regional collaboration” during a panel discussion on “A Regional Conference for the Eastern Mediterranean”.
“Of course it is one of the main impediments today,” he said. “First of all, because it’s a divided land, and as all divided lands it will fester with time and produce a set of problems that we even cannot envision today.
“We have to look at other places not far from Cyprus and see how unresolved – not only border dispute but national, symbolic and national feelings left unresolved – can fester with time and produce a set of nasty phenomena like terrorism, like violence, etc.
“The second issue is that Cyprus is today . . . one of the focal points where the two Mediterranean giants, Turkey and Greece, are confronting each other.”
Focusing on how heightened tension could be kept in check, he continued: “There is Nato, there is the EU, although insufficient.
“The EU, and it’s unfortunate, is not yet a diplomatic and a political actor, at least not a strong and unified one. National selfishness and egos are sometimes superseding.”
Prof Bahout added that the Cyprus problem is central to “other problems” such as gas, oil and energy in the Mediterranean Sea and which would not be “easy to deal with in a format like the EU”.
“You have a Mediterranean that was once a place of common values but that is today, more and more, torn apart and polarised between rising powers that are outside the Mediterranean. . . Russia is today a Mediterranean power,” he said.
The ADF was attended by “one out of every five foreign ministers” and 11 leaders under theme of “Innovative Diplomacy: New Era, New Approaches”, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said.