Cyprus-Forum.com

[zan]

Remind us again how many countries do not recognise Isreal>>>

[CopperLine]

Kifeas,
I agree with a lot of what you wrote, such as much of what is in the paragraphs re-quoted just below :

"TRNC" is nothing more than an imposed and subservient local regime of Turkey, the illegally occupying power of 37% of the de jure recognised territory of the RoC! This is the founding of the European Court of Human rights in both the Cyprus vs. Turkey interstate case rulings and the Loizidou vs. Turkey ruling.

It is for this reason that also the EU, in it's Cyprus treaty of accession with it, has accepted and confirmed (protocol 10 of the treaty) that the RoC sovereignty and de jure jurisdiction cover the entire island of Cyprus; and in fact that is why the whole of Cyprus -and not just the non-occupied areas, are regarded to have acceded the EU, always under the umbrella of the RoC -the co-signatory government of the treaty on behalf of Cyprus.

The Cyprus treaty of accession (which was part of the entire 10 new member enlargement treaty) was co-signed by all the EU institutions (the council and the commission) and each and every EU member state individually. The treaty was then ratified by the EU parliament and each and every member state parliament.

This treaty legally binds all the EU member states (including UK and France which hold a permanent position in the UN SC) tightly to its terms; something that leaves no room for anyone of them to ever recognise a separate entity in Cyprus, without the RoC consent! The alternative would have made the entire enlargement treaty to collapse (become invalidated,) and the entire EU as a direct consequence. Go and figure out what that means, and what chances a "TRNC" recognition has, either by the UN or the EU or any of its member states.

I also agree that there is not much chance, in fact a pretty slim chance that any other states will recognise TRNC, with good reason. All I'm saying is that other cases of state recognition which, on the surface of it were much less obvious or likely than TRNC, nevertheless occurred. Was recognition of Croatia a good thing or a bad thing ? A lot people argue with some justification that this single act of recognition unleashed the horrors and tragedies of all the 1990s Balkan wars.

Mr CopperLine, I am glad you have finally revealed what I have suspected from the first moment you made your appearance in this forum! I am glad you finally revealed your true colours!

How mysterious and enigmatic you are ! You declare that you've revealed my 'true colours' but don't actually say what you think they are !

Well, my friend, do whish and hope that an "entity" such as the "TRNC;" which was the direct outcome of an illegal act of foreign aggression, in violation of the UN Charter, and which is based on an illegal occupation of a sovereign UN and now EU member state; with all its side consequences such as the ethnic cleansing of 80% of the legal and legitimate population of this part of Cyprus, and the massive violation of all property and other human rights of its expelled indigenous population; (do hope) that it has any chance to ever become recognised as a legal entity, especially in view of this new dimension called the EU and the Cyprus treaty of accession! Do hope!

As I said above, I don't think the TRNC is going to be recognised by more states, largely for the reasons you give in this last paragraph. Also you mistake me for someone who 'hopes' that this will transpire. Whatever gave you that impression ? Trying to understand 'the other side of politics' is not the same as agreeing or supporting it.

Do hope, CopperLine (or shall I say Loupusdiavoli,) and while you are hopping, please also remember that Turkey will be seating and hopelessly waiting for its own entrance into the EU! Unless of course if you are naive enough to believe that there is a RoC government and /or a RoC parliament that will ever accept, sign and ratify the accession of its invader, occupier and ethnic cleanser of its people into the EU! Perhaps only if we are threatened, and in fact someone actually drops on us a couple of Atomic bombs, like those of Hiroshima! Maybe only then!

I don't know, should you say Wolfdevil ? You tell me. Why ? That's lost on me. As I said earlier, I'm not hoping (or hopping) for anything of the kind. Let's skip the sarcky stuff about naivite and go straight to the stuff on ethnic cleansing and invasion etc. Look, I don't know whether Turkey will accede to the EU (for what its worth, I suspect not) but if it doesn't it won't be because the EU doesn't admit ethnic cleansers or invaders. Almost the entire EU is composed of states which have done exactly this to their fellows. Indeed one of the major purposes of the EU is to stop war and violence by bringing perpetrators in from the cold. As they say, you can either have them inside the tent pissing out, or outside the tent pissing in. The EU has gone for the former. Why (some in) the EU wants Turkey in the tent is to avoid the continuation of the latter.

I just don't understand your reference to atoms bombs and Hiroshima.


Oh, and to the bloke who said I must be being paid for this, sorry to disappoint your conspiratorial fantasies ... but I wish.

[CopperLine]

There are about 192 member states of the UN of which a shade over 160 recognise Israel. Additionally virtually all international organisations and all the siginficant international organisations recognise Israel. Unsurprisingly most of the non-recognisers are in the Arab, or now, Muslim world. One of the earliest to recognise Israel was Iran but withdrew this recognition following the 1979 Revolution.

See http://www.un.org/members/

[GreekForumer]

Copperline,
what does International law have to say about "private property" (as opposed to sovereignty) ?

For example, East Jerusalem was captured by the Israelis in 1967. The private property of the Greek Orthodox church at that time is still,mostly, in church hands. I don't about private property in the Golan Heights.

What does International law say?

[CopperLine]

what does International law have to say about "private property" (as opposed to sovereignty) ?

For example, East Jerusalem was captured by the Israelis in 1967. The private property of the Greek Orthodox church at that time is still,mostly, in church hands. I don't about private property in the Golan Heights.

Good question.

As far as I understand, the basic principle of occupation law (that is the part of international law which applied in the Occupied Territories in East Jerusalem) is that the occupier must not make any changes either to the law of the occupied territories nor to the social organisation of those territories. Occupation is supposed to be temporary (!) If the territories in question are still a war zone then the laws of war still apply. Thus in the case of East Jerusalem, whether public or private property, the property should remain in the hands of the original owners and the way property is transferred during occupation must be according to the local pre-occupation municipal law. So long as a state declares that it is occupying and not annexing a territory then occupation law applies. In the case of Orthodox properties in East Jerusalem post 1967 my guess is that, broadly speaking, the above applied though I'm sure there were exceptions.

In a sense the case of TRNC is both more complex and more straight forward. Between 1974 and 1983 occupation law unquestionably applied in north of the Green Line. 1983 - and this seems to me the central significance of 1983 - marks the declared shift by the occupier from and occupier to a 'guarantor'. Now I know there are going to be howls of protest at what I next write, but the Turkish state basically reasoned like this : if we remain in the island on the same basis that we arrived then we'll be regarded in terms of law as an occupier. Turkish nationalists, including in the military, who had the upper hand in the 1980s by advocating a separate 'independent' TRNC could then say the occupation and 'peace operation' has ended, TRNC is a sovereign independent state and it can change and develop its own laws internally as it sees fit.

All of this is a political calculation, of course. And whether your are hostile to TRNC or sympathetic to TRNC it seems to me that Turkey made a big miscalculation - that is no other state came to recognise TRNC as they'd anticipated.

Let's go back to Israel and Palestine - over which there have been frighteningly many more deaths, killings, expulsions, land grabs, property questions than in Cyprus. (For all the trauma of division in Cyprus there has effectively been peace since 1974). Forces in Israel - effectively the right wing nationalist settler movement wanted Israel to ditch the occupation and simply annexe the OTs and much else as well. Other forces said no, that the 1967 borders should apply and annexation was both illegal and unwanted and that insofar as Israel's enemies in the OTs had to be controlled occupation (and occupation law) was sufficient until such a day as withdrawal was possible. So going back to the main question, the Zionist nationalists in Israel were basically saying 'tear up the restrictions of occupation law, we want annexation so that our new law applying to public and private property can prevail' and the two-staters were basically saying 'occupation law applies so long as there is an occupation, when we are able to get out then previous Jordanian, British Mandate and Ottoman law apply'.

In Cyprus basically most GCs are saying there's an occupation in the north, and therefore you can't change the law of property etc because occupation law forbids this. Many TCs are saying it is no longer an occupation but TRNC is a sovereign state, therefore we are not restricted by occupation law. Many TCs are still saying, even if independent the prior claims of GCs to property should be respected so let the two legal systems converge or at least acknowledge each other so that an 'accommodation' can be reached. A smaller number of TCs and many Turks are saying the occupation is over, this is a sovereign country, and they can do what they like even if the GCs don't like it. And of course there are many shades in between and beyond these three positions.


Daft question : anyone got another interpretation of occupation law ?

[Kikapu]

CopperLine,

I'm happy to welcome you aboard the Forum. It is very refreshing to have you with your knowledge of international Law and your explanations on details concerning Cyprus. Kifeas has already made his points, and by the looks of it, he has made pretty good points on Cyprus as to why the "TRNC" will not be recognised anytime soon, at least not without the approval of the RoC, which you seemed to have agreed with Kifeas on his reasoning's. I read this quote from you yesterday and it caught my eye, but did not have the time to respond to it, so I'll do it now.

The irony is that if the 1974 separation and the 1983 TRNC declaration had occurred respectively one decade later the chances are that TRNC would have been recognised immediately by the international community because of the developments in 'international humanitarian law' and the 'laws of war' following the end of the Cold War. You could say that TCs were just too far ahead of their time.

I know you are not saying, that you wished that the invasion by Turkey and the declaration of independence by the "TRNC" took place a decade later, would have made all the difference for the TC's as far as getting recognition for the "TRNC" and that it's too bad for the TC's being "ahead of their time". May I ask what logic you're using here. What has the cold war had to do with anything, had the TC declared independence yesterday. Why would that have brought recognition to the "TRNC" right away, as you put it. Had your reasoning been the case, don't you think the Palestinians would have declared independence, as Yasser Arafat wanted about 5 years ago, and was warned not to go that route without a peace deal with Israel. Since that time, the Palestinians could have taken your reasoning on Cyprus and declared independence for their own State. It never happened, why.?

The other example I would like to point out to you is Taiwan. Why have they not declared independence from China and be recognised as a independent state, even though they do enjoy recognition when it comes to commerce, but politically, almost everyone keeps them at arms distance despite being a UN member at one point many years ago, before withdrawing from the UN body, because pressure from China.. So if today the rules are different for anyone wanting to declare independence with whom ever they do not get along with, why don't they do it, as per your explanation. Even Kosovo is being blocked by Russia at the moment from becoming an independent State even though the majority in that state are Albanians and not Serbs.

I do not understand international Law at all, so any thoughts on the above, will be much appreciated.

[Pyrpolizer]

CopperLine,

1)Lupusdiavoli that kifeas referred to is/was another forum member writing in exactly the same style like you. To be honest I also suspected you were Lupus...
2)Imo you are getting lost in too deep thoughts and analyses. It seems to me you are an academic?
3)I really wonder what your purpose in this forum is. Are you targeting a specific audience, and if yes who are they?

[CopperLine]

I know you are not saying, that you wished that the invasion by Turkey and the declaration of independence by the "TRNC" took place a decade later, would have made all the difference for the TC's as far as getting recognition for the "TRNC" and that it's too bad for the TC's being "ahead of their time". May I ask what logic you're using here. What has the cold war had to do with anything, had the TC declared independence yesterday. Why would that have brought recognition to the "TRNC" right away, as you put it.

I'll leave the Palestinian example aside if you don't mind : it is, to coin a phrase, a whole different minefield.

On TRNC and being a decade or so 'too early', I'm suggesting that there were significant and substantive changes in both the interpretation of international law and in introducing new instruments of law (an instrument is just a lawyer's way of saying 'piece of law') in the shadow of the Cold War. To cut a long story short, Article 2 of the UN Charter prohibits the going to war i,e, in international law from 1944/5 war is illegal except for reasons of self-defence. Another way of putting it is that wars of aggression are illegal. That's why, for example, NATO and the Warsaw Pacts were defensive military alliances.
However after the end of the Cold War, especially from the early days of the Yugoslav wars, the UN & US Somalia intervention, Haiti and several other crises, the idea that military interventions could be conducted for humanitarian purposes began to be argued in international law. A humanitarian purpose could be to prevent ethnic cleansing or to provide relief for an oppressed group - there was and continues to be massive debate around these questions (as the Iraq war is testimony). Thus by the mid 1990s something of a shift had occurred in international law, moving from outright prohibition on war to at least entertaining the possibility of something called the 'duty to protect' or 'duty to intervene (for humanitarian purposes).'

Back to Cyprus. Turkey had 1959 guarantor powers (rights and duties), it had, it claims, duties of protection to TCs. The basic argument is that Turkey fulfilled its legal obligations under the 1959 agreement and 1960 constitution. (I'm not asking you to agree with this : I'm just reporting what part of the legal argument was). If you translate Turkey's 1974 justification into 1990s legal developments what the RoC called an 'invasion' i,e, aggressive war, in 1974 was called by Turkey a 'peace operation' i.e, claiming to fulfil its guarantor duty, and would by the mid-1990s have been called 'duty to protect'. In other words 1974 was, for Turkey's argument, a humanitarian intervention which by the 1990s had become a legally defensible, or at least arguable, position in international law.

Of course I expect nothing but howls of protest at having written that. But consider this, today, the sovereign state of Iraq has been invaded for 'humanitarian reasons' we're told, many are calling for intervention following a duty to protect in Sudan (Darfur) and Zimbabwe. There's still an intervention in Kosovo for similar broad reasons. I'm not suggesting for one minute that Cyprus was like Iraq, but international law is written in terms of principles not the scale of an alleged humanitarian abuse. In the legal language of the mid 1990s onwards, Turkey, I suspect - I'm not saying anything stronger than that - would have been more easily been able to invoke the humanitarian principle and the duty to protect argument than in 1974. Needless to say, there are lots of good arguments against this interpretation.

On the specific matter of declaration of TRNC independence, following the Yugoslav wars in particular, the idea that following humanitarian intervention to protect (ha !) peoples from ethnic cleansing, the protected territory should be returned to their former oppressor was, of course, anathema. One of the first things that was done to effectively say to FRY (Belgrade) 'you've blown it, you've oppressed these people, you're not having them back' was to recognise those states as new sovereign states. This is what the interveners actively did - Germany took the lead, other EU states and the EU and US followed in recognising the sovereignty of the former Yugoslav entities.

Back to the case of Cyprus, NATO and EU states undertook military interventions and gave international recognition to states in the 1990s for reasons and arguments that Turkey has used in 1974. That's what I mean by a decade or two too early. Or too late. Or these are no justifications at all.

[humanist]

Nothing leagl about the trnc said a member, yes but still it exists, because te international community is weak to act against, Turkey's illegalities. It's all about the OIL>

[CopperLine]

Pyropolizer

1)Lupusdiavoli that kifeas referred to is/was another forum member writing in exactly the same style like you. To be honest I also suspected you were Lupus...
2)Imo you are getting lost in too deep thoughts and analyses. It seems to me you are an academic?
3)I really wonder what your purpose in this fo

rum is. Are you targeting a specific audience, and if yes who are they?

1. No idea what this is, nor why it should be important.
2. Don't like superficial, lazy, throwaway comments which cause more trouble and division, such as racism. If you think that's 'deep thought', so be it. Keep guessing - though why this should be important to you is a mystery to me.
3. No idea what this is, nor why it should be important. Which is your preferred answer - 'I am in a Cyprus Forum because I'm interested in Timbuktoo' OR 'I am in a Cyprus Forum because I'm interested in Cyprus.' You pick.