Cyprus: Thoughtlessness and lies

Fact 2. The reason why the meeting on March 10-11 in The Hague failed was, because Annan tried to make the sides agree to these conditions. As a result, the person responsible for that meeting failing was not Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC) President Rauf Denktas, but Annan himself. Because, the "negotiation method" outlined in Annan’s plan did not allow sensible negotiation, Denktas did not really run away from negotiations.

Fact 3. Annan’s unacceptable stance, made Turkey and KKTC lose a very important year in their relations with the European Union.

In short, what Annan said in his report, about how Denktas ran away from the negotiations and how keen the Greek Cypriots were to solve the issue and approved of Annan’s negotiation method, as seen by their attitude in New York, were both lies.

Anyone who has followed the developments closely since Nov. 11, 2002, would have reached the same conclusion. However, a portion of the Turkish media were blinded to the facts listed above and ignorantly reported the lies as truths. The Foreign Ministry and Mr. Denktas failed to explain the facts to the media. Academic circles failed to publish a single article that would have uncovered this simple game. At the end, some believed in the fallacy that Mr. Denktas and the state were in tandem and trying to keep the Cyprus issue unsolved in order to prevent Turkey’s membership to the EU. We were divided. Under self criticism, we distorted many things. And then later, we feared what this division might result in. And most unfortunately, we weakened ourselves before the negotiations.

At the meeting in New York, it became obvious that neither side would accept Annan’s method of negotiation. The first portion of the Turkish proposal sees the negotiation of all the fundamentals of the Annan plan. Its acceptance will mean the elimination of almost half of the preconditions listed in paragraph 148 of the report attached to the U.N. Security Council resolution 1475.

The second portion sees Turkey and Greece joining the two sides on Cyprus to resolve the issues. As usual, Greece is trying to ignore its responsibilities as a guarantor country. Even though Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreu seems like a moderate, it is not surprising to those who know the country, to know that the Greek government will not carry any of the responsibility of solving the issue. To hear such statements like, "Let’s go to the U.N. Security Council for a decision," and "Let’s ask the EU to join in the negotiations," fails to hide the truth anymore.

The U.N. Security Council members know that Annan has exceeded his authority and if the sides do not agree (the U.N. law, Article 38) they can refuse to give him the power to fill in the blanks. If an application is launched at the U.N. Security Council, another month will be wasted to learn, what we already know.

The Greek proposal for the EU to enter the second and third level of the negotiations does not mean a thing. Who would represent the EU? What will be the EU’s status, because it’s not a guarantor power? The EU’s neutrality cannot be assured, because Turkey is not a member of the union.

Greece’s objective is to be rid of a few articles protecting the Turkish minority on the island, because they violate the EU constitution. The EU cannot do that, because it is against the principles of the agreement.

Greeks and Greek Cypriots, by making impossible demands, are trying to avoid being portrayed as running away from the negotiations. However, this time our eyes our open. Even our media won2t be tricked by such an evident outrage.