Cyprus-Forum.com

[T_C]

Nikitas I'll let another TC answer your question.

I was replying to Piratis who thinks we're full of excuses (mainly because he doesn't want/care to deal with our issues) and since your fears are much easier to deal with he just brushes us under the carpet.

If those GCs who think along the same lines are so sure things will be ok if we had a unitary state then why can't Turkey remain as guarantor? Don't get me wrong I understand why....but why can't they when it's us? Well actually I even understand that....because it involves making a sacrifice to Turks, but we won't go there....

[Piratis]

The ones who want to join GCs in the RoC are a minority, YES....BUT, there are thousands upon thousands of TCs who want nothing to do with Turkey as much as they want nothing to do with the RoC.

For me they are the same: partitionists.

Call it excuses all you want but TCs don't want to jump in to live with their (past) aggressors straight away, nor do they want to relocate to their old homes which some have terrible memories of...It's like trying to get people to agree step back for 40 years to "re-live" the experience. Thanks but no thanks...

Are the GCs ever going to agree to Turkey remaining a guarantor? NO! Why?????? Perhaps because they're scared history might repeat itself???? Oh but when TCs have these fears it's "excuses"

In the past we have suffered from you 100 times more than what you have suffered from us. Does this give us the right to ethnically cleansed you from Cyprus?

If it was not excuse then why you wouldn't accept an 18%-82% or even 10%-90% partition? You could feel perfectly safe in that 10% with as many Turkish troops as you wanted and no GCs.

Or maybe "security" is more important than land only when it is about you taking our land?

So stop hiding behind your finger. No TC is afraid that they will be harmed in 2007 with Cyprus being a democratic country member of EU. What TCs want is to Turkify an as big part of Cyprus as possible.

And regarding Turkey remaining as a guarantor, thats exactly what will happen if you allow legality to return.

So we in fact accept to live with that real threat called Turkey, which is a military ruled Nazi state with a population of 70 million and one of the top 10 armies in the world. We accept to live with this fear because we want a united Cyprus.

On the other hand what you want is partition and this is why you exaggerate by a factor of 1000 your own fears, to use them as an excuse to archive your aim.

If you honestly wanted unification, then in the EU member state Cyprus of 2007 there would be many ways within democracy and human rights to safeguard TCs.

[T_C]

In short what you meant to say is: "I couldn't care less about the TCs!"

[Viewpoint]

:roll: No they are not in the minority!

The ones who want to join GCs in the RoC are a minority, YES....BUT, there are thousands upon thousands of TCs who want nothing to do with Turkey as much as they want nothing to do with the RoC. Call it excuses all you want but TCs don't want to jump in to live with their (past) aggressors straight away, nor do they want to relocate to their old homes which some have terrible memories of...It's like trying to get people to agree step back for 40 years to "re-live" the experience. Thanks but no thanks...

Are the GCs ever going to agree to Turkey remaining a guarantor? NO! Why?????? Perhaps because they're scared history might repeat itself???? Oh but when TCs have these fears it's "excuses"

Excellent post Garagoz, you hit the nail right on the head but it will fall on death ears as Gcs do not want to understand let alone try to go some way to addressing and resolving our concerns.

[Viewpoint]

OK, I see that the challence, how to provide the sense of security one community wants without giving the other community a sense of injustice, remains.

Pyrpolizer- it was not I that said give the Turks everything they want and then a loukoumi on top, it was Prime Minister Karamanlis the elder. He said it when the Zurich agreement had been signed and he said it to Makarios. Imagine where we would be today if we had followed that advice. He had also said that the day the agreement was signed was the happiest day of his life. You can read between the lines and come to all kinds of conclusions.

For what it is worth my interpretation is that had we followed Karamanlis' advice Cyprus today would be a Greek island in all but formal name and ironcially the Turkish inhabitants might be fully satisfied with the situation. But that is another story.

Both "camps" used my question to restate their deeply entrenched positions without trying to undetrstand and empathize with the other side. Viewpoint for instance reasserts the fears of the Turkish Cypriots, but makes no effort to understand Greek Cypriot fears stemming from the presence of the Turkish army, settlers, exclusion from ancestral lands. I am willing to understand her PERCEIVED fear of me, but she is not for a minute willing to understand how her aspirations threaten me. The attitude is more than reciprocated by Greek Cypriot opinions here and the result is zero progress.

I did mention in my post that we must take into account the PERCEIVED fears of the other side. Regardless of the actual basis of a fear, if it exists it is real factor in the mix. Simple assurances are not enough for anyone, including me, when they tell mefor instance that the Turkish army is there to provide security etc.

Instead of reasserting our respective positions and rights how about stating our minimum requirements from a solution. See how that approach will lead us out of the impasse. I will start with some of my minimum requirements:

1- Not a single settler remains on the island

2- Not a single foreign soldier

3- Access to the whole of the island for all citizens

4- Guarantee of individual human rights as per UN charter, European Convention and EU aquis, for all citizens

5- Mutually declared exclusion of Partition and Union

6- A programme for the repatriation of Cypriots, guarantees to all Cypriots, and their descendants that they can return to settle in the island at any time

7- Conditions of safety and security for all communities of the island, as communities, since individual rights are already dealt with. Communities are not just Greeks and Turks but the others that we tend to forget in our headlong rush to assert "our rights"- Armenians, Maronites, Latins, Gypsies.

8- Defined programme for the removal of British Sovereign Base Areas in less than five years

These are SOME of my requirements. Some of you here will not agree, OK. But how do any of these requirements affect the need for safety for the "other community" and since I am Greek that means the Turkish community. And what requirements does someone like Viewpoint have that differ from the above? That is the sort of thing I want to see even if it is served without a loukoumi on top.

Nikitas you deserve a response so I as a TC will put down the main issues which are paramount to many TCs,

1) Political Equality

2) 2 states under a federal structure

3) Designated Area administered by TCs

4) Turkeys guarantee

5) No Armies on the island

[Nikitas]

Thanks Viewpoint and Garagoz,

Two responses so far, when there are more perhaps a picture will emerge. I wonder.....So far there does not seem to be an irreconcilable difference.

[Viewpoint]

Thanks Viewpoint and Garagoz,

Two responses so far, when there are more perhaps a picture will emerge. I wonder.....So far there does not seem to be an irreconcilable difference.

Im afraid you are out numbered there are to many Piratises and Kifeases who dont give a shit about what we think or our concerns, for them we are just an inconvenience and they truely believe that if they keep up the good fight with their attitude we willwant to reunite with hardliners like them. Well you will have to bury us all alive this time around.

[Nikitas]

Viewpoint,

Where do you dredge up all these violent images from? "Bury us all alive" is a horrifying idea! The object of the exercise is to see how individuals who think about Cyprus, and are obviously concerned about its future, regard a settlement and what is acceptable or otherwise to themselves personally. The personal point of view is what interests me most- what kind of setup you, and every other Turkish Cypriot here, wants to live in.

As for the opinions of others, well everyone is entitled to an opinion and a point of view and has a right to express it. Talking to the man on the street in the south you will find that the extreme views are the minority. Things do change.

[Viewpoint]

Viewpoint,

Where do you dredge up all these violent images from? "Bury us all alive" is a horrifying idea! The object of the exercise is to see how individuals who think about Cyprus, and are obviously concerned about its future, regard a settlement and what is acceptable or otherwise to themselves personally. The personal point of view is what interests me most- what kind of setup you, and every other Turkish Cypriot here, wants to live in.

As for the opinions of others, well everyone is entitled to an opinion and a point of view and has a right to express it. Talking to the man on the street in the south you will find that the extreme views are the minority. Things do change.

I disagree GCs are not sincere they do not reveal their true feelings which fester inside them and only when the given the opportunity for pay back do they let it all out. TCs say what they feel and hide nothing which on may occassions works against them.....

I use those expressions you do not like to hear in order to bring home how strongly we feel about certain issues.

Id say 99% of Tcs want separate areas...eg 2 states Gcs in the south Tcs in the north.

[Nikitas]

Ok,

I understand the separate states idea, but what access do people have to these states? The general description "separate states" can be interpreted in any number of ways.

And what about the other non Greek non Turkish communities what do they get? No one seems to give much of a damn about them, I guess if Armenia, Lebanon and Italy had the desire and the means to put their navies/armies around our area we might be more polite to these communities. They deserve some mention if only to maintain credibility in our postures of equality, fairness, rights etc.