Cyprus-Forum.com

[Lit]

Statements by the President of the Republic
19/09/2011

Turkey has no right to protest and threaten and to cause tension because of the Republic of Cyprus’ hydrocarbon exploration, the President of the Republic Mr Demetris Christofias stressed, calling on Ankara to realize at long last what its interests are and to work in the direction of the solution of the Cyprus problem, instead of causing tension and acting as a troublemaker in the area.

Speaking yesterday at a Cypriot community event in London, President Christofias said that the Republic of Cyprus is dealing with the Turkish threats with calm and is taking all the necessary actions, internationally, which find response. “Besides, it is no coincidence that various significant countries as well as the European Commission have stressed with press releases that it is the sovereign right of the Republic of Cyprus to explore and exploit its natural resources, always in the framework of the international law”, the President underlined.

President Christofias said that the search of the Republic of Cyprus for hydrocarbons is conducted in full compliance with the international law and specifically the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.

He pointed out that “Turkey cannot blackmail and hold hostage an independent state, member of the United Nations and the European Union, such as Republic of Cyprus, demanding that the Cyprus problem, which has itself created and maintains, be resolved”. “This is from all points of view unacceptable. With its whole behaviour and attitude Turkey is violating the rules of the international law and therefore remains internationally exposed”, he said.

“The exploitation of the natural resources is the sovereign right of states. Exercising its sovereign right, the Republic of Cyprus has for some time now preceded with the exploration in its own Exclusive Economic Zone, which it has delimitated with neighbouring countries and specifically with Egypt, Israel and Lebanon, he noted.

Referring to Ankara’s announcement that it intends to sign an “agreement” with the pseudostate to delimitate the continental shelf, President Christofias said that the cooperation and even more so the signing of so-called agreements with an illegal secessionist entity, such as the pseudostate, constitutes an illegality. “It is contrary to Security Council resolutions 541 of 1983 and 550 of 1984, which condemn the illegal act of Turkey to declare the so called state; an act, which the Security Council considers invalid and null, calling at the same time on all states not to recognize the secessionist illegal entity”, he added.

He further said that the united Federal Republic of Cyprus, in the framework of which the Greek Cypriots and the Turkish Cypriots will govern together, will exploit its natural resources and the two communities will reap the benefits that arise. “This is an issue which we have agreed in the negotiations, namely that the natural resources and their exploitation is the responsibility of the Federal Government, which will distribute the incomes through its budget to the two federal units”, he explained.

He underlined that Turkey can also gain from the solution of the Cyprus problem since it will lead to the restoration of its relations with Cyprus, the conclusion of agreements and cooperation in various sectors, not excluding the sector of energy, a sector that is of great interest to the European Union and not only.

He called on Turkey to point out to the Turkish Cypriot leadership that it should cooperate with the Greek Cypriot leadership at the negotiating table to achieve a mutually acceptable solution, which will serve the best interests of all Cypriots.

Referring to the continuing direct negotiations on the Cyprus problem, President Christofias said that all the substantive issues of the Cyprus problem were discussed to and in some there have been convergences and progress. “On other issues unfortunately no progress was made or much less convergences, than we and the international community expected, were archived”, he noted.

Finally, the President said that with the emergence of Mr Eroglu, the problems at the negotiating table have multiplied and the obstacles in the efforts to achieve a solution have increased, since the Turkish Cypriot leader reneges from convergences, which have been previously achieved.

http://www.moi.gov.cy/moi/pio/pio.nsf/A ... endocument

[Lit]

Drilling Begins Off Cyprus

Cyprus on Monday began exploratory drilling off its coast, searching for oil or gas offshore. The drilling is taking place in the waters off the south of the island nation, in order to ensure that there is no dispute with either Turkey or Lebanon.

Turkey has threatened to send warships to stop Cyprus' drilling, claiming that the drilling is a violation of Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus. The European Union has sided with Cyprus' project and told Turkey to stop threatening Cyprus.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/ ... ndWf9T4Kug

[Hermes]

Cyprus Begins Offshore Drilling for Gas, Energy Chief Says

NICOSIA, Cyprus – A U.S. energy firm has begun exploratory drilling for oil and gas off the coast of Cyprus, the divided island's energy chief confirmed Monday, despite strong warnings from Turkey not to do so.

The dueling comments reflected an escalating dispute over mineral deposits in the eastern Mediterranean, complicated by the status of Cyprus. The island has been divided since 1974 into an internationally recognized Greek Cypriot south and a breakaway Turkish Cypriot north, which is recognized only by Turkey.

In a significant escalation of tensions, Turkey said Monday it would send warships to protect its claims to undersea resources off the coast of Cyprus if the U.S. firm began drilling.

Cypriot energy chief Solon Kassinis told The Associated Press that workers on a rig belonging to Houston-based firm Noble Energy have already drilled 260 feet (80 meters) beneath the seabed at a location 115 miles (185 kilometers) off the island's southern coast.

The area is near sizable gas finds within Israeli waters, and within Cyprus' exclusive economic zone -- an area marked out following agreements with Egypt, Israel and Lebanon delineating Mediterranean undersea borders to facilitate the search for mineral deposits.

The Turkish government does not recognize the Cypriot government in the south, and vigorously protested the August announcement of Noble's intentions. Turkey says the Greek Cypriot drilling can derail long-running talks to reunify the island.

Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz said unless Cyprus halted the planned drilling, his country would send out its own energy research ship within a week, and the Turkish navy would "obviously" escort it.

"This work will be carried out together with the escort," Yildiz told reporters. "There will be no turning back on this issue."

Turkey has been pursuing an increasingly muscular foreign policy since the re-election of its religiously rooted government in June. It expelled the Israeli ambassador this month in a dispute over a deadly raid on a Turkish aid convoy trying to break the Israeli blockade on the Gaza Strip last year and pledged to send its navy to escort future aid convoys.

Cyprus' President Dimitris Christofias on Sunday accused Turkey and Turkish Cypriots of "clamoring needlessly," saying it would take another year until experts can determine the quality of the deposits and the feasibility of extracting them.

"If they truly want to jointly exploit this seaborne treasure that nature granted us, they have to seriously sit at the negotiating table," Christofias told Greek Cypriots in London. "If and when the Cyprus problem is solved, we will share this gift."

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/09/19 ... hief-says/?

[Nikitas]

The announcement that drilling is about to start in the north anyday is worthy of the Guinness records books.

It takes years of seismic surveys and months of planning as to the location of drilling platforms. But the Turks, inorder to fool the TCs as Kikapu aptly notes, are going to do all this in a few days.

The challenge now, if gas is indeed found in the Aphrodite block, is to make every Cypriot family stakeholders in the gas fin. A share certificate, valid only as long as it remains in the hands of the original holder, should be given to every family, GC, TC and other. This immediately nullifies the Turkish case and gives the TCs a more valuable share in the wealth of Cyprus than anything Turkey has given or promises to give.

Are we that intelligent? We will see soon enough.

[Hermes]

There are no other reasons as to why Turkey and the "trnc" are in such a panic mode of the exploration drilling by the RoC, other than they are afraid that the TCs will want to unify so that they too can benefit in the findings of Natural resources in "Block 12".

This is true. Turkey's real fear is that the discovery of gas and oil reserves by the Republic will merely demonstrate to Turkish Cypriots that Turkey's partitionist agenda has not "saved" them but rather deprived them of their rights.

Turkey is holding the T/Cs hostage and feeding them nonsense about conducting their own "explorations". Conveniently forgetting that the "trnc" is an illegal state which cannot enter into complex contracts or deals with third parties. The extraction and distribution of resources like oil and gas is a complex matter bound by established legal and international procedures. As Nikitas notes, it's not just a question of sending in a "Norwegian research vessel" on a fake drilling exercise.

The "trnc" can barely produce and sell its own potatoes never mind gas or oil reserves. It's time the T/Cs in the occupied areas realised that Turkey is treating them like fools and to demand back their rights as citizens in a unified state that Turkey is depriving them of.

When Turkey shouts about the "rights of the T/Cs" they are actually talking of the opposite and working on means to carry on depriving the T/Cs of their rights. This is the reality.

[Lit]

Turkey threatens offshore oil drilling with naval guard

(AFP) Source: http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/ar ... e395403.01

ANKARA — Turkey threatened Monday to start oil and gas exploration "very soon" and under naval escort in the eastern Mediterranean, after the Greek Cypriots said they had already started their own operations.

"We will start this within our exclusive economic zone very soon, possibly this week," Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told a news conference despite a call to desist from the European Union which Turkey hopes to join.

Erdogan also warned that the region "will be under the constant surveillance of Turkey's frigates, assault boats and the Turkish air force."

"This exclusive zone is disputed," he said, adding that Turkey had conveyed its complaints that what the Greek Cypriot government -- recognised internationally but not by Ankara -- had been doing was inappropriate.

Ankara only recognises the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), a statelet set up in the wake of the island's division in 1974 following Turkey's invasion.

The Greek Cypriot energy chief said Monday that US energy firm Noble had started exploratory drilling for gas off the southern coast of the island.

Solon Kassinis told the semi-official Cyprus News Agency that Noble had begun drilling Sunday night from its Aphrodite platform inside the island's exclusive economic zone.

Turkey's Energy Minister Taner Yildiz earlier called on Cyprus to hold off "immediately" on the planned drilling, failing which Turkey would retaliate.

He said Ankara had signed an agreement with a Norwegian company for seismic drilling off the island, but he declined to name it.

"First of all, we will start exploration with one vessel," Yildiz said.

Turkey has repeatedly called on Cyprus to postpone its gas exploration, saying the Greek side has no right to do so while the island remains split, thus leaving the Turkish north out of the picture.

Yildiz repeated that "depending on the developments, Turkey could sign a continental shelf agreement" with the TRNC, which would grant Turkey the right to share offshore energy sources.

The Greek Cyprus government, which says its hydrocarbon search is to the benefit of all Cypriots, has angered Turkey further by seeking to extend cooperation with Israel in the exploration and export of natural gas.

In December, Cyprus and Israel signed an agreement defining their maritime border that allows the neighbours to forge ahead in the search for energy sources in the eastern Mediterranean.

Turkey and Israel have been locked in a bitter dispute since May 2010 when Israeli naval commandos stormed a convoy of six ships trying to reach the Gaza Strip in defiance of an Israeli naval blockade, killing nine people.

The row also threatens to complicate Turkey's relations with the European Union, which Ankara has warned it will freeze when EU member Cyprus takes the rotating presidency of the bloc as scheduled next year.

"That will be an important choice for the EU, between Turkey and Greek Cyprus," he said.

Maja Kocijancic, spokeswoman for EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, said Monday that the EU urges Turkey "to refrain from any kind of threat or sources of friction or action which could negatively affect the good neighbourly relations and the peaceful settlement of border disputes."

Kocijancic repeated EU calls for a comprehensive settlement for Cyprus, saying, "All parties should exercise restraint and do their utmost to facilitate success for completion of this process."

"We have also underlined the importance of progress in normalisation of the relations between Turkey and all EU member states, including for example Cyprus," she told a press briefing in Brussels.

[Nikitas]

Seismic drilling???? There aint no such animal. There is seismic exploration where shocks are caused and the way they travel through the layers of soil under the sea reveal if there is a chance for oil to be found. Drilling is a hard business that requires the positioning of rigs and takes months of preparation. As far as I know Turkey has no undersea drilling equipment.

In the confusion, caused mostly by Turkey getting its knickers in a twist, we have forgotten some salient facts:

1- Israel has found gas in its EEZ. The Israeli gas will be shipped overseas from Cyprus. This is a major business deal which no one can interfere with and it is not subject to any Turkish or other misinterpretation. The gas exports can be by ship or by a pipeline to Greece and beyond. The establishment of a joint Cypriot-Israeli terminal creates defensible Israeli assets in Cyprus, and Israel has over 1000 strike planes to defend such an installation.

2- Cyprus gas, if discovered, will be exported via the same route. This does not affect the above deal.

3- Turkey wants to disrupt No2 above, but it is confusing the issue so that it might affect No 1 too, which will not happen naturally.

4- Turkey is causing trouble south of Kastellorizo hoping to establish a claim of an EEZ which cuts off the EEZ of Cyprus from that of Greece. They think that this will prevent gas exports to Europe and thereby maintain the importance of their pipelines. This is bullshit because LNG gas exports are now happening from places much farther from Europe than Cyprus, like Qatar for instance.

I am expecting the big one to come from Turkey soon- an offer to link Cyprus with a pipeline to Turkey, another pipeline amongst the many the Turks have proposed, to carry Cypriot gas to Europe. When they do that we will know that they have a sense of humor.

[Lit]

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu in New York on Monday that the U.S. supports negotiations to reunify Cyprus. But she also said the island's recognized government had a right to decide how it exploits its resources, officials present during the meeting said.

The officials said Clinton told Davutoglu that the best way to sort out the problems related to energy and economic development is by finally ending the 37-year standoff, according to the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the meeting was private.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/09/ ... 8086.shtml

[Nikitas]

Davut made it all the way to New York to hear it in person. Lay off is the message but I wonder what spin he will put on it.

[humanist]

The Turks are dum peoples with a bit of cash therefore they think they have class. Unfortunately money and class are not mutually associated. These shepeherds have no idea about etiquette. They just don't get it.