metecyp wrote: I think the RoC could have used the situation better.
I totally agree. At the time certain politicians were saying that the demand that people crossing the checkpoints show their passports instead of IDs was unacceptable. And of course the biggest fear amongst the GCs is recognition of any sort of administration in the north. When the attorney general said that showing passports doesn't mean anything, then people started pouring in. But the first reaction was completely wrong, and if that was different then things would be different now.
Of course what the RoC was hoping was that noone would cross to the north, putting more pressure to the other side so that the passport request would be lifted. Didn't happen of course, as certain people didn't care, and anyway the attorney general (who came from DISY at the time) had explained that ordinary people cannot recognize states from day 1.
For example, right after the borders opened, the RoC could have asked TCs to fill their positions in the RoC and maybe a commitee of TCs and GCs could have been formed in the RoC to work on a possible solution. Or a TC could have been sent to the EU to represent the Cyprus delegation.
First of all, you have to accept that however sincere a proposal from the RoC on this could have been made, the words that would come from the mouths of Eroglu and Denktas, the players at the time, would be that it's a "GC trick" to embark on the "GC train" and that we are trying to use TCs to "patch the RoC". Filling in the TC posts would definitely be a shocking proposal, but to tell you the truth the only people that would propose that are hardliners right-wing... that envision a unified state, and they know a priori that TCs would reject it. That may have brought a tension in both sides.
Don't forget one thing metecyp. On the 12th March 1998, Clerides proposed a formula for TC representation in the negotiating team. The TCs could choose their representatives in the team, and if there wouldn't be agreement in the TCs and GCs participating in it about an EU issue, that issue would be dealt with later on in the negotiations. Also at the time, Clerides asked to make possible the resumption of preferential trade to the EU from the northern part of Cyprus and to facilitate the disbursement of EU funds there. So the "embargo" would be lifted. Of course Denktash had rejected the offer.
After 5 years, when the negotiations had been completed and all the obstacles surpassed, you realized that we actually made it, and you wanted your share. You can have it, I don't think anyone objects to that. But you have to understand that hiding behind this "usurpation" story has cost you a lot. You guys started thinking that the RoC is perhaps the way forward in 2004. We did that in 1964.
