by Tim Drayton » Sun Oct 04, 2009 10:50 am
There is no clear geographical definition of where the eastern boundaries of Europe lie. It is often said that the continent ends at the Ural Mountains, and also at the Bosphorous. This is a bit confusing because the first of these features lies 1500 kilometres further east from the other. The truth is that Europe is predominantly a cultural phenomenon. The whole of Cyprus and all of its people feel European to me so I have no problem with describing Cyprus as European. One thing is sure; the Turkish Cypriot community is, in general terms, about a century ahead of the population of mainland Turkey when it comes to attaining Ataturk's stated goal of catching up with Western civilisation.