Turkish Cypriots isolating themselves

Friday, July 21, 2006

Clement Dodd

Is the isolation of the Turkish Cypriots a myth? Or, if it exists, has it been brought about by the Turkish Cypriots themselves? In a recent article in the Cyprus Mail the seasoned and balanced chief reporter, Jean Christou, presents the case. He gives the Greek Cypriot government's views on the subject, and also quotes the opinions of two academics. He notes the Greek Cypriot government's concern that ending isolation would greatly encourage the political independence of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC).

To start with the government, their case is essentially that it is not the Turkish Cypriots, but Turkey that is responsible for the economic and social isolation of the KKTC. This, the government explains, has been brought about in a number of ways, which Christou lists. First, Turkey has in the past prevented the Turkish Cypriots from obtaining Cyprus passports, identity cards and other documents that would have facilitated travel, and would have enabled them to obtain EU and other benefits. Also it has been Turkey that has been behind the rejection of confidence building measures because such measures could not promote the political recognition of the north. As for the depressed state of the economy in the KKTC, Turkey is responsible for that by introducing the unstable Turkish Lira as the currency. This has led to high inflation, economic instability, and other serious economic and social problems. In addition, the Turkish Cypriot economy has been inefficiently managed by Turkey. To underline the point the Greek Cypriot government emphasizes how much the Turkish Cypriots have benefited economically since the lifting [by the Turkish Cypriots, incidentally] of restrictions on movement in 2003, an enrichment of Turkish Cypriots enhanced, they say, by Cyprus' membership of the European Union. Clearly Turkey, they say, should not have prevented the Turkish Cypriots from joining the Cyprus delegation involved in EU accession negotiations. Moreover, Turkish Cypriots are now working in increasing numbers in the government controlled areas and enjoy a large range of benefits, including free medical care. The Greek Cypriot government also asserts it has strongly supported, and even proposed, EU financial assistance to the North, but there have been efforts to attach political stipulations to its release.

What does all this mean, we might ask? Clearly, in the Greek Cypriot government's view, if only Turkey had left the Turkish Cypriot minority to remain as a minority, with minority rights, how rich and happy they would be! The troublesome notion that man does not live by bread alone is quietly ignored, as is any suggestion that the Turkish Cypriots themselves in fact, have considerable control over their own affairs. One foreign diplomat observed, with obvious acerbity, that the Turkish Cypriots can indeed participate in anything and everything, as long as they do so under the Republic of Cyprus flag.

The two academics whose views are reported take a different line. Herbert Faustmann (Intercollege, Nicosia) claims, ?The isolation of the Turkish Cypriots is, as a phrase, a political and propaganda tool.? Isolation is ?partly inflicted on themselves [not by Turkey in this case] and they never mention that.? How, we may ask, have they done this damage to themselves? The answer is ?by isolating themselves in 1983 with the unilateral declaration of independence.? Faustmann continues: ?That's what triggered part of the isolation, but of course they keep a low profile about that. And the phrase, as it is used, also hides the demand for political equality.? This is odd. The Turkish Cypriots have never hidden their demand for political equality and the U.N. has long accepted it. If it were given real practical expression, the Turkish Cypriots would be free to open up their country to the world and make a very satisfactory living for themselves.

The second academic, James Ker-Lindsay, advances a similar idea, and is quoted as saying, ?To be brutally honest the isolation of the Turkish Cypriots is in large part the fault of the Turkish Cypriots.? He goes on to assert that if Rauf Denktaº had not declared independence, ?there wouldn't be a U.N. resolution declaring the KKTC illegal, because there would be no KKTC.? He continues by saying that although the Greek Cypriots had played a hard game in the EU, and had stood in the way of a number of measures that might (sic) have helped the Turkish Cypriots, a lot of other measures that the Turkish Cypriots blame on the Greek Cypriots were a result of U.N. Security Council resolutions that prevented other states from offering recognition. ?There is no way past this,? he said.

This raises important issues, but two fairly simple points about embargoes can first be made. First, the embargoes on the Turkish Cypriots began before 1983 and were reinforced in particular under the presidency of Spyros Kyprianou that began in 1977. In 1979, the Turkish Cypriots called for them to be lifted. Secondly, major economic restrictions were placed on the Turkish Cypriot economy in 1994, long after 1983, when the European Court of Justice, in response to Greek Cypriot representations, ruled that Turkish Cypriot produce exported to the EU must have phytosanitary certificates and certificates of origin stamped by the Greek Cypriot authorities.

More important, it is true that the U.N. Security Council's decisions have prevented recognition of the Turkish Cypriots. We have to enquire, however, how those decisions came about. In the first place, in 1964 in Resolution 186, the U.N. Security Council treated the unconstitutional rump Greek Cypriot government as the government of the Republic of Cyprus. This was an illegal act by the U.N. Security Council, but it should not be forgotten that to bring it about the Greek Cypriots had campaigned extensively for recognition among the many new ex-colonial and non-aligned U.N. states and effectively lobbied the very sympathetic U.N. Secretary-General U Thant. The Makarios government was also making overtures to the Soviet Union that appeared to be threatening the British bases at a time when the Soviet Union was becoming powerful in the Middle East. Consequently Britain and the United States did not strenuously object to resolution 186. The United States was afraid lest Cyprus become another Cuba.

Later, between 1979 and 1983 Kyprianou's government, with the help of Greece, made intensive efforts to enroll the sympathy and support for their ?plight? as a country emerging from colonial rule and suffering from a rebellious minority supported by a country, Turkey, in league with the imperialist West. This internationalizing of the Cyprus issue militated against the 1977 and 1979 high-level agreements made between the two sides to establish a federation. This campaign, and the ensuing, and very damaging, U.N. General Assembly resolution of May 13, 1983, greatly persuaded Denktaº that in pursuing federation the Turkish Cypriot state had to be on equal terms with the Greek Cypriot state. In terms of the 1960 Treaties both the KKTC and the Greek Cypriot state were illegal, but the U.N. Security Council, in its resolution 541 of Nov. 18, 1983, declared only the KKTC to be illegal, and called upon all states not to recognize it. As has been pointed out in learned legal opinions, the Security Council is a political, not a legal body. Venturing into the legal field, it could not legally condemn the Turkish Cypriot declaration of independence without also taking into account the prior illegality of the Greek Cypriot assumption of sovereignty over all of Cyprus. In short, the legal ruling of the U.N. Security Council cannot carry any weight. It was the very effective politicking of the Greek Cypriots as members of the UN, with the help of Greece, that brought about the declaration of independence and the subsequent politically inspired U.N. Security Council resolution 541, in the formulation of which Britain played a major role. It called upon all states not to recognize any Cypriot state other than the Republic of Cyprus. It was a political result of an unacknowledged alliance in the U.N. between the numerous non-aligned states and the western powers, the latter fearful, no doubt, of jeopardizing the important defense arrangements in Cyprus by opposing the Greek Cypriots. It resulted in a denial of the Turkish Cypriots' natural right to make a proper living for themselves, and to interact freely with the world in other ways. It is difficult to see how or why Turkey, or the Turkish Cypriots, were, or are, responsible for this unjust and damaging isolation, an unjustifiable denial of the human rights of the Turkish Cypriots.

* Clement Dodd, Professorial Research Associate, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.