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Sunday, November 15, 2020
Turkey has occupied the northern part of Cyprus militarily since 1974. Now President Erdogan also wants to create facts officially. With a controversial visit to the coastal region of Varosha, he turns against the Cypriot and Greek governments, but also many local residents.
Turkish head of state Recep Tayyip Erdogan has called for a permanent two-state solution for Cyprus. “There are two separate towns and two states in Cyprus,” Erdogan said on a controversial visit to the capital, Nicosia. A solution for the Mediterranean island must be based on this. Erdogan provoked the ire of Cyprus and Greece with a visit to the controversial coastal region of Varosha in northern Cyprus.
With his demand for two separate states, Erdogan contradicted previous efforts to find a solution to the Cyprus conflict, which provide for the reunification between the Greek Cypriot south and the Turkish Cypriot north.
The sympathies are clearly distributed in the northern part of Cyprus.
(Photo: Picture Alliance / dpa)
Turkey has militarily occupied the northern part of Cyprus since 1974 and is the only country that recognizes the Republic of Northern Cyprus there. The president of Cyprus, a member of the EU, which forms the southern part of the island, had strongly condemned Erdogan’s visit to Varosha in advance. The head of state, Nicos Anastasiades, spoke of an “unprecedented provocation”. Greece also criticized Erdogan’s visit, calling it “a direct violation” of current UN resolutions.
Distribute the island’s resources fairly
Due to heavy rains, the picnic announced by Erdogan on the beach of the old Varosha resort did not take place; instead, Erdogan read a message to the press. In it, he called for a “fair distribution of the island’s resources”, which had never been granted to the Turkish Cypriots. At the same time, he promised to compensate the Greek Cypriots who fled from Varosha.
The coastal city is located in the UN buffer zone between the two parts of the island. Varosha had been cordoned off by the Turkish army since 1974 and was not released again until October. At the beginning of the week, protesters, including some Turkish Cypriots, protested against Erdogan’s visit to Varosha. They chanted: “There is no picnic on the back of others!” and he shouted “In Cyprus the word belongs to the Cypriots!”
Erdogan, on the other hand, said in his speech in Nicosia that it would not be possible to bring together the Turks and Greek Cypriots. “You can’t dry today’s clothes in yesterday’s sun.” The last peace talks for Cyprus under the auspices of the UN failed in 2017.
“Today’s clothes, yesterday’s sun”
The Mediterranean island has been divided into a Greek south and a Turkish north since 1974. At that time, the Turkish army occupied the northern part of the island after a military coup by the Greek Cypriots. The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is only recognized by Ankara. It is economically and politically dependent on Turkey. Around 30,000 Turkish soldiers are stationed there.
Erdogan’s visit came a few weeks after the presidential elections in northern Cyprus, which were won by the nationalist Ersin Tatar, backed by the Turkish president. Unlike its predecessor Mustafa Akinci, Tatar advocates a permanent two-state solution.
Relations between Turkey, on the one hand, and Cyprus and Greece, on the other, are currently extremely tense in the dispute over natural gas reserves in the eastern Mediterranean. In addition to Greece and Turkey, Cyprus also claims the area.
