Kikapu wrote:CopperLine wrote:
Look at this map and regret.
Had the vote for the AP been positive then much of what everyone on this forum is haggling over would have been resolved. The whole island would be within the EU, GCs and TCs woiuld have had property-losses addressed, Turkish settlement would have come to an end, the Turkish military would have left, and the territorial 'division' would have been completed (i.e, as of today, Varosha would have been returned over two and a half years ago).
No, the AP was by no means perfect and was open to all sorts of criticism, but better to be vaguely right than precisely wrong.
Any other solution is going to be a variety of AP (or worse). If only we had made the Cyprus problem history.
CopperLine,
The AP being a Confederation Plan as well as both north and south being the "founding states" of the New United Cyprus, what makes you think that the north would not have separated to become an independent sovereign state and remain a EU member at the same time, which would have served Turkey's interest in order to have influence in the EU through the north state with their EU veto power in the EU. Also, as a Confederate "founding state" the north state could have given as many citizenship's to the future settlers from Turkey and made them EU citizens in short time, which then would have been spread all over the island at will. How long do you think it would have taken for the new Turkish EU citizens to take ove the whole island in your view.?? In the meantime, Turkey would have retain her guarantorship over the whole island, including the south state. Everything in the AP could have been turned upside down by the slightest ethnic altercations for Turkey to remain in Cyprus with her troops citing her garantourship rights, and don't think for a moment, there wouldn't have been ethnic violence cooked up sooner or later to justify for Turkey to remain in Cyprus. AP had 9,000 + pages to deal with and not the one or two soundbites you have introduced above on what ifs. What you have pointed out had the AP passed could be easily be categorized as being
"Penny wise and a Pound foolish" for the GCs, hence the strong 76% rejection by them. What more do you need to know about what the AP was all about..??..!
CopperLine, can you also tell me who made this quote below, please.!
"TRNC could be recognised at the drop of a hat, just as Slovenia, Croatia, and other former federal Yugoslav states were even though the FR of Yugoslavia in the form of the core state of Serbia Montenegro violently opposed their secession and international recognition. The irony is that if the 1974 separation and the 1983 TRNC declaration had occurred respectively one decade later the chances are that TRNC wouuld have been recognised immediately by the international community because of the developments in 'international humanitarian law' and the 'laws of war' following the end of the Cold War. You could say that TCs were just too far ahead of their time."
In politics anything is possible, so Kikapu, yes what you fear may have come about, but I don't think so. That's the point of a negtotiated settlement : you attend to the possibilities and one tries to limit the negative possibilities by putting in procedures and practices which minimise the chances of those negatives arising. As I've said many times here, the AP was by no means perfect, but I challenge anyone to propose anything which has anything like as strong a chance of agreement and approval. (If this forum were any reflections of reality then the "best" most likely proposals would gather no more than say 10% of a popular vote, in my estimate).
OK so AP had problems but we all know that current and future negotiations have taken AP as a basic default from which new (and not so new) variations have been discussed. The UN and the EU are publicly committed to some variant (albeit under different names) and RoC, TRNC and RoT negotiators have all publicly stated, repeatedly, their commitment to a UN-EU backed process. There is only one game in town, it is AP version 2.0 or X.whatever.
Of course states can renege on an agreement, but this is not peculiar to Turkey. In fact regarding the Cyprus question, the RoC has more to be embarassed about reneging on agreements, not least regarding EU accession. But let's not bicker about that. Any agreement is as strong as the reasons for compliance and the costs of 'defection'. In my view there were huge interests for Turkey to honour AP commitments. To use a contrary aphorism "Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves."
I simply don't buy your nightmare scenario on Turkish immigration and citizenship claims post Annan. There is absolutely no evidence from the rest of the EU enlargement process that 'fortress Europe' has been weakened in the way you alarm.
On the last point, I stand by every word of it. (Although you should note that that was a comment about recognition and declaration of independence. The ICJ case was solely about the declaration of independence in international law, not recognition. Recognition is a national political question and not a matter of international law).
