Cyprus-Forum.com

[Piratis]

Kifeas, I agree with you and I didn't say anything different.

People should return to their homeland (villages, towns etc). When this happens the TCs will be minority in places like Kerynia and Greek Cypriot villages or mixed villages with GC majority. Therefore they can not "run" those places. What they can "run" are the TC villages or the the mixed villages with TC majority, not because they are TCs but because they are the legal majority in that area(s).

And I repeat that this can happen not because they have such right, but because we could make this as a compromise, as long as they make compromises as well.

[humanist]

Phoenix

Please go away debased Turks!

You've made our lives a misery for long enough.

No more excuses regarding your indecent behaviour.

. . . you are not fit to live amongst us.

Mate go easy, we all need to work hard on understanding each other. Eventually we will live together so the eralier we all start respecting each other the better the transition will be, thanks.

We too have made their lives miserable also at some stage. It takes two to tango, and we have to dance with TC's.

As far as mainlander Turks go .... well go for your life though remember they too are human beings,

[CopperLine]

Piratis, you are making the same mistake that VP is doing! You are falling into the same absurd trap! In modern constitutional democracies, who "rules" and who "runs" a place, is not ethnic group(s,) but the people (the citizens) that live in the respective constituencies, regardless of their ethnic, cultural or religious backgrounds!

Kifeas is spot on here. It is misleading to speak of 'legal majorities' (or legal minorities for that matter). That there may be numerical majorities of one communtiy or another does not translate into the notion of 'legal majority' (whatever thay may mean). The only way that the term 'legal majority' seems to make sense is to ascribe greater rights or greater legal priviliges to the community that is in a numerical majority. But to do so would violate the basic republican and democratic principle of equality amongst ciitizens.

If the issue is presented as 'does onesupport citizens' rights or communal rights' then I'd go for citizens' rights every time. Indeed I'd oppose any notion of collective rights having a higher or more detrmining status than individual and citizen rights. The latter is by no means perfect and there are lots of problems generated by individual rights but theyr are a fraction of the disasters and horrors that have been generated over the last couple of centuries by notions of collective and differentiated rights.

[Viewpoint]

No one is asking you to gift us the north, all we ask is for the right to run the north like you wish to run the whole island. Whats wrong with allowing everyone the right to settle north or south of the island to choose whether they wish to live under either GC or TC administration? what do you fear?

VP is saying the following absurdity:

Everybody should be free to settle wherever they want in their country; however, the north will be under TC administration! What does this basically mean is that those GCs that will return back into the north, will have no democratic, political or constitutional rights to rule (or to participate in ruling) upon themselves; but only the TCs living in the north will do, and they will also be ruling upon the GCs too! Otherwise, how can VP’s notion that “the north should be under (exclusive) TC administration" may possibly ever hold water?

Yet, VP claims that what she is asking is not for the GCs to gift the north to the TCs!

Sorry VP, but things do not work in this way! The north, and the south, as well as the whole of Cyprus, should be under the administration of the people (the individuals) that legally and legitimately are the citizens and they live, work and pay taxes within each respective territory, state, province or country, and they should all have equal rights and obligations!

What you are asking is to take us back to the colonial times, or the years of the Ottoman or Venetian Empire, etc! These things (unfortunately for your neo-ottoman delusions,) have long gone and they are not coming back!

There is no place in Europe (perhaps there are today a few such backward places in Africa or in Asia) that is under the control or the administration of one single ethnic group or community, alone! The US for example, institutionally or constitutionally, is not under the rule, the control or the administration of the English or the Jewish "community," but under that of the American citizens! Same holds true for every single EU country or territory, state or province, within the EU!

Switzerland
Belgium
Ex Serbia & Montenegro
San Marino
UK (England Scotland Wales N.Ireland)

Your arguments are flawed, Cyprus is not a very large island and GCs who live in Kyrenia the North state can chose the GC leaders they wish to represent at the federal level but in order for a balance to be struck with regards to local administration then why not apply eg 70% 30% in both states as per the 1960 agreements you cling onto so dearly today. Kifeas just admit it you do not want to share with us on an equal level and you want to use the 80% imbalance to eliminate my community rights reducing me to just another minority where I am forced to live in a GC state run by Gcs for Gcs, we ill then be foreigners in our own country like the TCs in the Uk or Australia. This will never happen as TCs will never accept moves that will give you what you want we would rather stay like we are today until you can start to appreciate we are equal partners on this island and treat us accordingly.

[Viewpoint]

Why should TCs "run" areas that the legal majority is 5 times more GCs than TCs????

As I said before, if TCs want to run a separate area, that area can include only the villages that TCs are the legal majority. This is not something they have the right to, but something we could compromise for in order to have BBF, as long as TCs make compromises as well.

But TCs running areas that we are the majority, thats out of the question of course.

Piratis, you are making the same mistake that VP is doing! You are falling into the same absurd trap! In modern constitutional democracies, who "rules" and who "runs" a place, is not ethnic group(s,) but the people (the citizens) that live in the respective constituencies, regardless of their ethnic, cultural or religious backgrounds! There is no such a notion like "an ethnic element (community,) as such, should be ruling upon a constituency;" more so when this constituency is or will be of a multiethnic or a multicultural composition! Such an idea under the EU aqui, principles and values, is a non-existing one, and rightfully so!

With a 80% 20% imbalance how will you ensure that the GCs do not repeat their racist and discrimination acts of the past, we do not want to run to the EU and ECHR every time we wish to pay our water bill. How will you ensure TCs will be employed in all walks of life and that we will not be brushed to one sides by a decision making mechanism which is predominantly GCs?? these issue you can ignore as you will not be the once faced with these very fundamental problems in your own country. Add to this the removal of the Turkish Army and no borders and hey presto you have the GC state you have always wanted with us as no different from the Pontians. Over our dead body think again its time to compromise or forget ever uniting this island, as TCs are here and we count we are the other half of that apple which you have to treat as your equals not your subordinate.

[Kifeas]

Piratis, you are making the same mistake that VP is doing! You are falling into the same absurd trap! In modern constitutional democracies, who "rules" and who "runs" a place, is not ethnic group(s,) but the people (the citizens) that live in the respective constituencies, regardless of their ethnic, cultural or religious backgrounds!

Kifeas is spot on here. It is misleading to speak of 'legal majorities' (or legal minorities for that matter). That there may be numerical majorities of one communtiy or another does not translate into the notion of 'legal majority' (whatever thay may mean). The only way that the term 'legal majority' seems to make sense is to ascribe greater rights or greater legal priviliges to the community that is in a numerical majority. But to do so would violate the basic republican and democratic principle of equality amongst ciitizens.

If the issue is presented as 'does onesupport citizens' rights or communal rights' then I'd go for citizens' rights every time. Indeed I'd oppose any notion of collective rights having a higher or more detrmining status than individual and citizen rights. The latter is by no means perfect and there are lots of problems generated by individual rights but theyr are a fraction of the disasters and horrors that have been generated over the last couple of centuries by notions of collective and differentiated rights.

Thank you very much CopperLine, but I think you should rather direct this towards the TCs, than to the GCs, for it is them that make all this fuss, and they support or aim for communal rights on an exclusive basis, and in the expense of citizen's rights I may add! The TC assumption is that the country should be governed not by its citizens as units, but by the two communities as units, and this on an exclusive 1:1 basis! They insist on this "procrustean bed" notion, as if in this country we only exist through and on the basis of our communal identities, alone; and not at the same time as equal citizens to each other, on an individual basis! The end result, since 1960, is to permanently have an on going vertical polarisation of the people of the country, on the basis of their background ethnic identities!

PS: Have you had a chance to read the "TC Constituent State Constitution," that was drafted and included as part of the Anan Plan package? I must admit when I first read it, only 2 days before the referendums, I had to vomit a few times; and it was the final and ultimate turning point against the Anan plan, as far as I was concerned! One has to read it to realise how pervert the TC approach was towards the notion of a Bi-zonal and a Bi-communal Federation!

[Kifeas]

No one is asking you to gift us the north, all we ask is for the right to run the north like you wish to run the whole island. Whats wrong with allowing everyone the right to settle north or south of the island to choose whether they wish to live under either GC or TC administration? what do you fear?

VP is saying the following absurdity:

Everybody should be free to settle wherever they want in their country; however, the north will be under TC administration! What does this basically mean is that those GCs that will return back into the north, will have no democratic, political or constitutional rights to rule (or to participate in ruling) upon themselves; but only the TCs living in the north will do, and they will also be ruling upon the GCs too! Otherwise, how can VP’s notion that “the north should be under (exclusive) TC administration" may possibly ever hold water?

Yet, VP claims that what she is asking is not for the GCs to gift the north to the TCs!

Sorry VP, but things do not work in this way! The north, and the south, as well as the whole of Cyprus, should be under the administration of the people (the individuals) that legally and legitimately are the citizens and they live, work and pay taxes within each respective territory, state, province or country, and they should all have equal rights and obligations!

What you are asking is to take us back to the colonial times, or the years of the Ottoman or Venetian Empire, etc! These things (unfortunately for your neo-ottoman delusions,) have long gone and they are not coming back!

There is no place in Europe (perhaps there are today a few such backward places in Africa or in Asia) that is under the control or the administration of one single ethnic group or community, alone! The US for example, institutionally or constitutionally, is not under the rule, the control or the administration of the English or the Jewish "community," but under that of the American citizens! Same holds true for every single EU country or territory, state or province, within the EU!

Switzerland
Belgium
Ex Serbia & Montenegro
San Marino
UK (England Scotland Wales N.Ireland)

Your arguments are flawed, Cyprus is not a very large island and GCs who live in Kyrenia the North state can chose the GC leaders they wish to represent at the federal level but in order for a balance to be struck with regards to local administration then why not apply eg 70% 30% in both states as per the 1960 agreements you cling onto so dearly today. Kifeas just admit it you do not want to share with us on an equal level and you want to use the 80% imbalance to eliminate my community rights reducing me to just another minority where I am forced to live in a GC state run by Gcs for Gcs, we ill then be foreigners in our own country like the TCs in the Uk or Australia. This will never happen as TCs will never accept moves that will give you what you want we would rather stay like we are today until you can start to appreciate we are equal partners on this island and treat us accordingly.

No VP, I do not accept your pervert interpretation of all things concerned visa vie a solution on the basis of a B&B Federation, and if your side is going to insist on this, I personally would rather choose a complete partition on the basis of a territory proportional to the legal demographics (82:18 and not a square inch more!)

The 80% "imbalance" that you mentioned, is not an imbalance but a fact of life, namely that 80% of the people of Cyprus are of Greek ethnic or cultural background, and there is nothing you or me can do about it! If you want to see the people of a country through the lenses of ethnic identities, then yes 80% are of one such identity, and the 18% are of another, etc! I as a resident of Pafos district, I live in a "minority" district group of citizens, visa vie the residents of Limassol district! Should I say that the 60,000 Pafian residents should have the same collective amount of political output rights, as the amount of collective political output rights the 200,000 Limassonian residents should have? Do we both pay the same collective amounts of taxes, to have the same amount of collective political rights? On an individual level, yes we are all equal, but on a district population level, we are not! Limassol district contributes 40% of the GDP of the country, Pafos contributes only 15%!

What you should be content with, is to at least in the federal government have a balance of both individual citizen based and community based rights, without the one functioning in the expense of the other, instead of trying through procrustean methods to level-out the two communities and equate them! If you do not want the GCs to be among your community for the fear of their numbers, the only way is to withdraw into the 18% of the country and have a formal partition! If you want GCs among your community, then you have no choice other than to accept that as individuals they should have the same human, political and cultural rights as those of the members of your community, in each and every area in which they will be residing, and on the basis of this area or state! There is no other way around it, since Cyprus is not India to be constituted by castes of citizens that you want to make of us!

[Piratis]

Piratis, you are making the same mistake that VP is doing! You are falling into the same absurd trap! In modern constitutional democracies, who "rules" and who "runs" a place, is not ethnic group(s,) but the people (the citizens) that live in the respective constituencies, regardless of their ethnic, cultural or religious backgrounds!

Kifeas is spot on here. It is misleading to speak of 'legal majorities' (or legal minorities for that matter). That there may be numerical majorities of one communtiy or another does not translate into the notion of 'legal majority' (whatever thay may mean). The only way that the term 'legal majority' seems to make sense is to ascribe greater rights or greater legal priviliges to the community that is in a numerical majority. But to do so would violate the basic republican and democratic principle of equality amongst ciitizens.

If the issue is presented as 'does onesupport citizens' rights or communal rights' then I'd go for citizens' rights every time. Indeed I'd oppose any notion of collective rights having a higher or more detrmining status than individual and citizen rights. The latter is by no means perfect and there are lots of problems generated by individual rights but theyr are a fraction of the disasters and horrors that have been generated over the last couple of centuries by notions of collective and differentiated rights.

What I refer to is the illegality of ethnically cleansing the whole GC population from the north part of Cyprus where they have been the great majority.

As long as the international law and the human rights of Cypriots are respected, which would mean that Cypriots would have the right to take back their properties and live again in the towns and villages that they had been ethnically cleansed from, then I agree 100% with what you said above.

Personally I said many times that Cypriots should not be divided based on their ethnic background or anything else. Each citizen should be equal, one person one vote, and beyond that each person is free to identity himself as he wishes (Like in the USA they have "Italian Americans", African Americans", "Irish Americans" but for the state they are all equal citizens)

The problem is that TCs want to keep Cypriots divided along ethnic lines.

[Viewpoint]

Kifeas

No VP, I do not accept your pervert interpretation of all things concerned visa vie a solution on the basis of a B&B Federation, and if your side is going to insist on this, I personally would rather choose a complete partition on the basis of a territory proportional to the legal demographics (82:18 and not a square inch more!)

Then take to the streets and campaign for division as the majority of TCs think like me.

The 80% "imbalance" that you mentioned, is not an imbalance but a fact of life, namely that 80% of the people of Cyprus are of Greek ethnic or cultural background, and there is nothing you or me can do about it! If you want to see the people of a country through the lenses of ethnic identities, then yes 80% are of one such identity, and the 18% are of another, etc! I as a resident of Pafos district, I live in a "minority" district group of citizens, visa vie the residents of Limassol district! Should I say that the 60,000 Pafian residents should have the same collective amount of political output rights, as the amount of collective political output rights the 200,000 Limassonian residents should have? Do we both pay the same collective amounts of taxes, to have the same amount of collective political rights? On an individual level, yes we are all equal, but on a district population level, we are not! Limassol district contributes 40% of the GDP of the country, Pafos contributes only 15%!

Apply your methodology to the EU structure and see how it will work, why does the little "RoC" have veto rights? why dont you now declare that you do not want them and you will go along with everything the majority wants, they can take all the decisions without consulting you.

What you should be content with, is to at least in the federal government have a balance of both individual citizen based and community based rights, without the one functioning in the expense of the other, instead of trying through procrustean methods to level-out the two communities and equate them! If you do not want the GCs to be among your community for the fear of their numbers, the only way is to withdraw into the 18% of the country and have a formal partition! If you want GCs among your community, then you have no choice other than to accept that as individuals they should have the same human, political and cultural rights as those of the members of your community, in each and every area in which they will be residing, and on the basis of this area or state! There is no other way around it, since Cyprus is not India to be constituted by castes of citizens that you want to make of us!

The 2 state solution is the only way forward and the only one that will be acceptable to TCs as the past has left deep wounds wich will need time to heal after unification via a BBF. You can have regional autnonmy and still be one country look at Switzerland. Your main goal appears to be ensuring GC domination via their numbers and we say let each community administer their own region so all Cypriots have the choice to live either in a GC or Tc state, we can adopt your suggest structure for federal Government and start to build trust and understanding. Who knows in 10 years time we may not need any of these safeguards as we will have proven that we can work and live together for the benefit of all Cypriots.

[Kifeas]

No VP, you make a mistake here! Constitutionally this is not the case in Switzerland, as you want to have it in Cyprus! A German speaking Swiss may go and permanently live in a canton in which the French speaking Swiss are the majority, yet he will not be treated differently that the existing French speaking permanent residents! He can have his political rights in that new place /canton and through that place /canton, without restrictions other than that he has to be a permanent resident! Same holds true in Belgium! Furthermore, there is a substantial difference between the cases of Belgium or Switzerland and Cyprus! The various cantons or states in these two country, had a historical almost exclusive or by great majority existence of people belonging to those certain ethnic groups (French speaking, German speaking, etc.) In our case, you (TCs) have never had a historical presence by exclusivity or by large majority in any part of Cyprus, to claim that it is your part of the country alone! The fact that you now live exclusively in the north and the GCs in the south, is not the result of a natural or historical concurrence, but the result of an illegal invasion, occupation and an illegal ethnic cleansing of the GCs from a part of their country in which they even used to be the majority! The ethnic separation that we observe today in Cyprus, is an artificial one, due to an illegal invasion by a foreign country; therefore you have no legitimate, historical or other wise natural right to claim that part of Cyprus to be of your ethnic (community) ownership, alone! This, unlike the case of Belgium or Switzerland, where the various separate “ethnic” territories have either a natural or a historical basis!