Cyprus, Turkey and the EU: Time for a sense of proportion and compromise By David Hannay ★ The start of Turkish accession talks provided a faint glimmer of hope for unfreezing the Cyprus stalemate that has prevailed since the Greek Cypriots voted down a UN-sponsored settlement plan in 2004. However, the negotiations could be blocked unless Turkey fully implements its customs union agreement with the EU by allowing Greek Cypriot ships into its ports. Turkey has refrained fro m doing so because the EU has not fulfilled its pledge to re s t o re trade links with Nort h e rn Cypru s . ★ A prolonged stand-off would only make the search for a comprehensive settlement even more d i fficult. Neither the EU nor Turkey should think of postponing an eff o rt to sort out the Cyprus problem until later in the accession process. The risk of the Greek Cypriot administration vetoing Turkish membership would remain, and that would prevent a reunification of the island in the long term. ★ The EU can help to avoid this risk by supporting separate solutions to the ports and trade questions, while at the same time supporting longer term eff o rts to find a comprehensive settlement. In April 2004, Greek and Turkish Cypriots held referendums on a UN-sponsored plan to re-unite their island. While the Turkish Cypriots accepted the socalled Annan plan, the Greek Cypriot side rejected it. Since then, the Cyprus dispute has been deadlocked, perhaps even more so than before the referendums, since politicians on both sides can now claim a popular mandate for their position. During the last two years, nothing has happened to encourage the belief that a settlement acceptable to both sides is within reach. On the contrary, subsequent events have mostly been discouraging. Not surprisingly therefore, the traditional external advocates of a negotiated settlement – the UN, the European Union, the United States – have kept their powder dry, somewhat traumatised and frustrated by the unsuccessful outcome of so much diplomatic hard labour. One major event – of potentially great significance for the solution of the Cyprus problem – did occur during
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this dead season: the opening of Turkey’s EU accession negotiations in October 2005. It is reasonable to assume that the Cyprus problem will have to be resolved before Turkey joins the EU, not because that is a formal legal requirement but because Turkey could not become a member of the EU while the north of the island remains in its present limbo. But even the positive impact of the start of accession talks has been mitigated by growing opposition to Turkish membership within the EU, and by the waning enthusiasm of the Turkish government for sweeping aside the obstacles to membership under its own control. Moreover, Turkey has allowed itself to be manoeuvred into a no-win situation over the extension of its customs union with the EU to the ten new member-states that joined in 2004, including Cyprus. Under the terms of its accession negotiations, Turkey committed itself to ratifying the protocol for the extension of the customs union, which among
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