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Who's Fault is it ?????

How can we solve it? (keep it civilized)

Postby paaul12 » Fri Dec 08, 2006 3:31 pm

A quick quiz question. What links the following four top Eurocrats: the EU Commissioner for External Relations, the Commissioner for Health and Consumer Protection, the Commissioner for Transport and the Environment Commissioner?




The answer: they have all led a charge, in recent days, to impose tough sanctions on Turkey for failing to open its ports to ships from Cyprus.

Confused? Unsure why the environment commissioner and the guy in charge of health are so worked up about Turkey?

Maybe this helps. The same four commissioners can also be described in the following way. They are, respectively, Austrian, Cypriot, French and Greek - ie they are from countries where the prospect of Turkish EU membership is the hottest of political hot potatoes.

Now some in Brussels get terrifically upset by this kind of thing, arguing that the 25 commissioners are supposed to be working as true Europeans, not as shills for their home states.

They point to the fact that Commissioners take a formal Oath of Independence when they take up office, swearing not to receive instructions from partisan lobbies (or national capitals).

There is even a wrinkle of Brussels protocol that Commissioners and officials are discouraged from talking about "my country". Instead, they are supposed to refer to "the country that I know best".

Building on that theme, there is a rather cloying Commission slogan that you see on bumper stickers round town, or stuck up on the pinboards of earnest EU functionaries, saying: "My country - Europe".

Try telling that to the Cypriot Commissioner, Markos Kyprianou, a nice enough chap, and pretty efficient when it came to handling bird flu the other day.

I'm told Mr K has solid enough hopes of being prime minister of his home island, sorry, the island he knows best.

So when it comes to keeping voters in Nicosia happy, it's a hardline on Turkey from the consumer protection commissioner.

I myself do not get upset by such blatant domestic politicking. But that's because I like nation states, or rather, I regard them as the least worst unit of government yet created: big enough to attract talented people into their civil services (unlike the ghastly drones who infest local and regional governments), but close enough to their electorates to be meaningfully democratic.

In my two years here, I have seen previous few signs that the EU is the superstate that the Eurosceptics back home insist.

Yes, there are federalist bureaucrats within the machine, some of them self-hating Brits who take a special pleasure in taking the UK to task, or doing down the Government in London.

But underneath, the real driving motor is made up of nation states, all using Europe to further their own ambitions and causes.

That is not always good for Britain - often the national interests of the majority run counter to our own view of the world.

But it is a form of transparency, nonetheless. Tell me this or that commissioner is trying to block Turkey, and it makes no sense.

Tell me it's the Greeks and the French, backed by the Austrians and Cyprus, and it all becomes clear. :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:
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Postby DT. » Fri Dec 08, 2006 4:28 pm

:lol: :lol: you're a funny guy!
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Postby alexISS » Fri Dec 08, 2006 4:41 pm

paaul12 wrote:Tell me it's the Greeks and the French, backed by the Austrians and Cyprus, and it all becomes clear. :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil: :evil:


You have no clue who your friends are. Greece honestly wants Turkey to become an EU member, as long as she complies with EU regulations. There are, however, many EU countries that just want Turkey out regardless of how the negotiations end up or if the ports open for Cypriot ships
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Postby paaul12 » Fri Dec 08, 2006 4:58 pm

You have no clue who your friends are. Greece honestly wants Turkey to become an EU member, as long as she complies with EU regulations. There are, however, many EU countries that just want Turkey out regardless of how the negotiations end up or if the ports open for Cypriot ships


Dont we know it, and NUMBER ONE is greek cyprus :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
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Postby alexISS » Fri Dec 08, 2006 9:42 pm

paaul12 wrote:
You have no clue who your friends are. Greece honestly wants Turkey to become an EU member, as long as she complies with EU regulations. There are, however, many EU countries that just want Turkey out regardless of how the negotiations end up or if the ports open for Cypriot ships


Dont we know it, and NUMBER ONE is greek cyprus :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:


I thought I could start a more serious discussion with you but I was obviously wrong. Laugh away!
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Postby rawk » Fri Dec 08, 2006 11:07 pm

Never argue with an idiot. The people watching might not know the difference.

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Postby humanist » Fri Dec 08, 2006 11:10 pm

Paul if you feel that it is fair that people invade and steal people's properties and then they have to go to any court to legitimise their claims I am very affraid we live in a sad, sad world. Do you honestly think that if ever there is a solution to the Cyprus problem and not all refugees are given the right of return to their properties, there will be peace on the Island.

I am affraid that it will not. The bitterness will grow and fester until there is an explossion bigger than 1974. And the emotional and social drift among Cypriots will be ever so great. People will drive passed their homes feeling that theyr were unjustly taken from them and that will cause a bigger separation than exists now.

I appreciate that Turksih Speaking Cypriots feel they were discriminated against prior to 1974, this will only cause more heart ache and pain for both communities. The sda thing is that whilst Turkey gains EU membership and the likes of Germany & UK achive their goal in support of Turkey the long term effects for Cypriots will be none but painful ones, socially, psychologically and cutlturally. The peoples of Cyprus will never be one because they have not been allowed to develop their Cypriot identity and the bitterness will continue. In essence no one has won anything.

At the end of the day Turkish Speaking Cypriots may end up with one third of Cyprus' landmass but that is all there is a landmass, if we have any astute politicians and leaders around the world hopefully they will be visionary ones to see that the sociocultural issues will continue on and on unless a just solution is found for Cyprus.

I cannot comprehend how the world has not learnt fro the Israeli/ Palestinian strugle that has been going on for six decades. If that is the future of Cyprus you are wanting then we are in sad, sad times.
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Postby observer » Sat Dec 09, 2006 12:43 am

With all this Good news for Turkey and the TRNC Property Commission, is any one taking bets on how long it will be before Greek Cyprus starts blaming the UK and the USA for all their troubles?


I must have missed something - when did they ever stop blaming the UK and the USA for all their troubles?
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