Tatar: UK discriminating against Turkish Cypriots
PRESIDENT Ersin Tatar has accused the UK of discriminating against Turkish Cypriots after they were excluded from the Cyprus leg of the “Queen’s Baton Relay” to promote next year’s Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.
Cyprus was the first stop on the baton’s route last weekend after leaving the UK, but it only passed through locations in the South.
This paper reported last week that Turkish Cypriots in the UK — including a member of the House of Lords, Baroness Hussein-Ece — were upset that photos from a South Nicosia press launch for the baton relay, attended by Deputy British High Commissioner Ben Rawlings, showed banners in only English and Greek.
The British High Commission told Cyprus Today in a statement that the Greek Cypriot Olympic Committee
was responsible for organising the baton relay. The committee did not respond to a request for comment.
Issuing a statement on Sunday following coverage of the issue in this paper, Mr Tatar said: “Despite the Queen saying that [the Commonwealth Games] will embrace cultures and that this ‘collective journey will ignite hope, solidarity
and collaboration’, we see the exclusion of the Turkish Cypriot side from this event by the UK, which is a guarantor country of Cyprus, as clear discrimination.
“This biased behaviour also raises the question of whether the UK no longer sees the Turkish Cypriot People as a Commonwealth people . . . It is a legal, contractual and moral responsibility for the UK to treat Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots equally.
“In this context, we find it significant that the event poster was in English and Greek.”
Mr Tatar also referred to promises to end the isolation of Turkish Cypriots by former Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2004 following the failed “Annan Plan” referendum, saying that the
failure of the UK to fulfil those pledges in the 17 years since is “unacceptable”.
“All of this raises the question of whether the UK now sees the so-called ‘Republic of Cyprus’ exclusively as a Greek Republic and only the Greek Cypriot People as a part of the Commonwealth,” he added.
“If this is the real situation, then it will be possible to evaluate this as a positive development, at least towards the acceptance of the realities on the island.”
Meanwhile Ayşe Osman, chair of the Council of Turkish Cypriot Associations in the UK, has written to Mr Rawlings about “your exclusion of the Turkish Cypriot community” from the Queen’s Baton Relay press event.
The letter criticised the British government, saying that the “Turkish Cypriot community continues to be
discriminated against by the UK in favour of those living in the south”.
The letter then moved on to criticising the Commonwealth as a whole, saying that the organisation is “deliberately excluding Turkish Cypriots in Cyprus” and that this “breaches our human rights”.
Ms Osman requested an online meeting with Mr Rawlings to “discuss how [the British High Commission] can engage with an exiled community from a situation not of our making”.
She also argued that the exclusion of Turkish Cypriots from such events amounts to recognition of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus as an independent state.
“As such, the TRNC should be given the same freedoms afforded to other states, such as direct flights,” she added.