Cyprus-Forum.com

[Kifeas]

ANKARA - Turkish Daily News
Cyprus divisions run deep after talks with UN envoy
Saturday, June 4, 2005
Turkish and Turkish Cypriot leaders made it clear yesterday that they were unwilling to negotiate a set of ideas floated by the Greek Cypriot leadership for the resumption of fresh talks concerning the reunification of the island under the United Nations auspices.

Greek Cypriot leader Tassos Papadopoulos presented a set of suggestions to a senior U.N. envoy visiting the island earlier this week to assess the chances of restarting reunification talks. In his proposals, Papadopoulos reportedly called for a complete withdrawal of Turkish troops from the island, the return of Greek Cypriot property in the Turkish north and an end to Turkey's rights as a guarantor country.

“I would not like to express an opinion on these,” Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül told reporters yesterday, emphasizing that the Greek Cypriot proposals were not formal. “They do not have any written proposal that has been officially conveyed to the Turkish Cypriot side. They are repeating what they said before last year's referendum.”

Turkish Cypriot President Mehmet Ali Talat, who met Gül and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in closed-door talks in Ankara on Thursday, also dismissed the Greek Cypriot proposals.

“These are completely outside the basic parameters of the Annan plan,” he told NTV television, referring to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan's blueprint for the island's reunification that collapsed last year after it was rejected in an April 2004 referendum by Greek Cypriots, adding, “Because they are outside the Annan plan, it is impossible to negotiate them.”

The Turkish side insists that any fresh talks should be based on the U.N. plan. Talat said the balances set between the Turkish and Greek Cypriot sides in the plan must be protected.

Talat, speaking to reporters before leaving Ankara, also dismissed prospects that the Turkish side could not take any step to push the process forward and added that the United States could put pressure on the Greek Cypriot leadership by taking further steps towards ending the isolation of Turkish Cypriots.



Prendergast despondent:

The talks in Ankara between the Turkish and Turkish Cypriot leaders came days before Erdoğan is scheduled to meet with Annan in New York on June 7.

Annan sent his special envoy U.N. Undersecretary for Political Affairs Sir Kieran Prendergast to Cyprus for talks with Turkish and Greek Cypriot leaders this week. Prendergast met with Papadopoulos on Tuesday and with Talat on Wednesday and Thursday.

Greek Cypriot news reports said Prendergast was left with little hope over chances to restart the stalled reunification process after his talks on both sides of the island. According to Greek Cypriot reports, Prendergast saw a big divide between the two sides' positions that cannot be bridged at the moment.

Yesterday, Prendergast met with Greece's Foreign Minister Petros Moliviatis in Athens as part of his tour of the region. Declining to say whether any progress has been made, Prendergast said after the meeting, “I'm here to take the pulse, and the pulse is still beating.”

Prendergast is now expected to hold talks in Ankara before reporting back to Annan in New York on June 7.

[Alexandros Lordos]

Prendergast said after the meeting, “I'm here to take the pulse, and the pulse is still beating.”

At least that is one piece of good news in all this gloom-and-doom.

Personally speaking, I am disappointed with Talat. He seems to be using exactly the same techniques as Tassos before the referendum last year: "These changes are outside the parameters of the Annan Plan, we cannot negotiate them". But if you are unwilling to negotiate Security and Property Rights, how are you going to get a solution?

Talat has an answer to that as well: "Once direct trade is granted to us, the GCs will feel the pressure and return to the negotiating table". Will direct trade make GCs change their negotiating positions, will it make them willing to accept less on Security and Property Rights? No, but it will most certainly reduce the motives of TCs for a solution - if they feel that recognition and prosperity can come without a solution - thus cementing the division of the island and making GCs and TCs enemies for centuries to come ...

[Kifeas]

Prendergast said after the meeting, “I'm here to take the pulse, and the pulse is still beating.”

At least that is one piece of good news in all this gloom-and-doom.

Personally speaking, I am disappointed with Talat. He seems to be using exactly the same techniques as Tassos before the referendum last year: "These changes are outside the parameters of the Annan Plan, we cannot negotiate them". But if you are unwilling to negotiate Security and Property Rights, how are you going to get a solution?

Talat has an answer to that as well: "Once direct trade is granted to us, the GCs will feel the pressure and return to the negotiating table". Will direct trade make GCs change their negotiating positions, will it make them willing to accept less on Security and Property Rights? No, but it will most certainly reduce the motives of TCs for a solution - if they feel that recognition and prosperity can come without a solution - thus cementing the division of the island and making GCs and TCs enemies for centuries to come ...

I couldn't agree more with you, Alexandros.
However, when Papadopoullos was commenting last year on the TC positions as being outside the parameters of the A-plan, it was in the Nicosia round of talks when Denktash was presenting demands that were gearing towards a confederation solution. This was clearly outside the parameters of the plan.

What are the parameters of the plan, anyway?
In my view, the parameters of the plan are nothing else than a solution on the basis of a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation. Nothing else! Whatever suggestion or demand changes this concept of solution, should rightfully be considered as being outside the parameters of the plan. If Denktash was asking things that were altering the concept of the sought solution to that of a confederation of two already existing sovereign states, then he was indeed outside the parameters of the plan.

In the case of Papadopoullos proposals for the elimination of guarantee treaties and complete demilitarisation and also the issue of properties, I do not think he is outside the parameters of the plan.

What do you think?

[gabaston]

guys
Please correct me if im wrong here, but Paps wants the return of Gc property and no guarantor treaty?

So that’s everything except the enclaves (according to gc official records), and without protection. 63 without protection?
Am I right here? Have I missed something?

[Kifeas]

guys
Please correct me if im wrong here, but Paps wants the return of Gc property and no guarantor treaty?

So that’s everything except the enclaves (according to gc official records), and without protection. 63 without protection?
Am I right here? Have I missed something?

Most likely you are missing everything, gabaston!

[gabaston]

go on then.....

what have i missed?

[Kifeas]

go on then.....

what have i missed?

You are simply misssing so much that I do not know were to start from.

[Alexandros Lordos]

guys
Please correct me if im wrong here, but Paps wants the return of Gc property and no guarantor treaty?

So that’s everything except the enclaves (according to gc official records), and without protection. 63 without protection?
Am I right here? Have I missed something?

I guess one can interpret Tassos' demands - or, more accurately, the demands of the GC community - to be as you suggested. But it needn't be taken as absolute. Sure, GCs would like a plan where Turkey has no intervention rights whatsoever under any circumstances, and with full property restitution with no exceptions whatsoever, but in reality these are just the directions in which GCs would like to see the negotiations move, it doesn't mean that there is no middle ground where the concerns of the two communities can meet.

In my view, the parameters of the plan are nothing else than a solution on the basis of a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation. Nothing else! Whatever suggestion or demand changes this concept of solution, should rightfully be considered as being outside the parameters of the plan. If Denktash was asking things that were altering the concept of the sought solution to that of a confederation of two already existing sovereign states, then he was indeed outside the parameters of the plan.

In the case of Papadopoullos proposals for the elimination of guarantee treaties and complete demilitarisation and also the issue of properties, I do not think he is outside the parameters of the plan.

What do you think?

Yes, the agreed basis for a solution is not the Annan Plan but the High Level Agreements of 1977 and 1979. The high level agreements mention nothing about the Security aspect, so I suppose this is open to discussion, while for Property Rights the 1977 agreement talks of "taking into account the practical difficulties of the Turkish Cypriot community, and the agreed framework of a bizonal federation" - so any solution to Property which just kicks the TCs out of their current residences and sends them back to Paphos and Limassol is outside the parameters of the Plan. But other than that, the Property issue is open to discussion.

[gabaston]

Alex thankx for your response.

[Kifeas]

guys
Please correct me if im wrong here, but Paps wants the return of Gc property and no guarantor treaty?

So that’s everything except the enclaves (according to gc official records), and without protection. 63 without protection?
Am I right here? Have I missed something?

I guess one can interpret Tassos' demands - or, more accurately, the demands of the GC community - to be as you suggested. But it needn't be taken as absolute. Sure, GCs would like a plan where Turkey has no intervention rights whatsoever under any circumstances, and with full property restitution with no exceptions whatsoever, but in reality these are just the directions in which GCs would like to see the negotiations move, it doesn't mean that there is no middle ground where the concerns of the two communities can meet.

Alexandros,
For the sake of the argument, what you have said above as a reply to gabaston’s interpretation of Papadopoullos’ “proposals,” is as much incomprehensible, as his own interpretation.

Gabaston is saying that Papadopoullos, via his “proposals” (the word in inverted commas because we do not know yet how the exact proposals are,) wants a solution that will equate to the 1963 status of TCs, except the enclaves but without protection from Turkey. Is this a correct and fair conclusion and /or interpretation of Papadopoullos’ and the GC side’s demands? Only someone who is completely out of the spirit of the whole issue and someone who is lacking even the minimum knowledge or understanding of the issues could possibly reach to such an arbitrary and nihilistic conclusion, imo.

It is for this reason that I didn’t bother giving an answer to such a conclusion, because I figured out it would be a waste of time. Sorry gabaston!

Yet you replied to him by saying that you “guess one can interpret Tassos' demands - or, more accurately, the demands of the GC community - to be as you suggested.”