askimwos wrote:
I have expressed my views a lot of times regarding the Annan plan but in brief here are my views:
The Annan plan was the most comprehensive plan that ever appeared in the 32 years since the turkish invation and it is sad that this initiative did not end in the way it was supposed to end - being the solution of the CyProb. There are a number of factors that played a part in this failure. Here are the ones that I consider the most important:
a) The US and UK factor: Both the US and UK assummed that the GC would accept the plan no matter how many negative elements it will include. They viewed Turkey (not the TCs) as the side that is more likely to reject the plan as it hadn't been long since Turkey was stating that the CyProb was solved with the trnc established. As a result of the above they ended up changing the 1st plan, that was welcomed by the GCs as a good start to negotiate and built on, to plan number 5 which more or less satisfied the 11 points set forward by mr Erdogan. This made an already negative climate regarding the absence of progress in the negotiations between January 2004 and May 2004 even more negative.
b) The absence of time and space for manouvering for the GC side between the 4th and 5th plan. It is worth saying that in plans 1, 2 and 3 the GCs felt that there was some space to manouvre and this was the point in the plan that allowed GCs residing in the TC statelet to vote and be elected for the TC statelet representatives in the parliament. The GC side were planning to exchange this right that the 3rd annan plan gave them and which was seen as a red line for Turkey with the right for more people to return and get their properties back and for the complete demilitarisation of the island and the abolition of the guarantor states point. Unfortunately, the UN with the backing of the US and the UK took away this manouvring space without making any equivant value concessions to the GC side. As a result the end product was rightly described as unbalanced.
c) The weakness or lack of will of the TC leaders to align themselves with the GC side in demanding a number of things that would benefit both communities. One of these was the abolition of the clause in the plan that gave the UK sovereingty over the sea and airspace surounding their military bases in Dekelia and Akrotiri as well as the Guarantor state clause that if abolished would mean real independence.
d) I am a person that supported the plan until its 3rd form with the hope that there would have been changes that would have pushed the GCs to vote for it. Unfortunately the last round of negotiations in Bourgenstock failed to fullfil these expectations. I will remind you of the climate of the next day after the release of the 5th plan - the Turkish news papers coming out with frontpages stating "Solution Ala Turka", the GC newspapers moarning for another missed chance and for the 5th plan not giving the chance to the GCs to vote Yes but also Afrika's reaction to the 5th plan that was a frontpage stating that the plan does not allow for a solution as everything that Turkey asked she got with no real concessions to the GC side.
I have to say that at the time I was sharing a flat with a TC friend and we both were litteraly hanging over the radio to listen how the negotiations were developing. I will never forget the look on his face when the 5th plan was release - the guy looked at me and he said "the fucking bastards (refering to US and Turkey), they are trying to partition the island by forcing GCs to say No".
In the past I posted 4 main things that if changed there will definetely be a yes vote from the GC side without the TCs loosing anything. These were:
1. Complete demilitarisation of the island (we don't need the 900 and 600 Greek and Turkish troops staying on the island indefinetely)
2. The abolition of the Guaranto powers clause. Instead we can have an International UN force on the island until Turkey enters the EU. Cyprus is a member of the EU and things have changed since the 1960. Guarantor powers mean absence of independence.
3. The issue of functionality of the solution - we don't need a veto in everyday government administration. Lets share the ministries and government services so a to have the president/CEO of each service/ministry taking the decisions and not being vetoed by the vice-president/CEO. TCs can take 30-40% of these CEO positions and GCs take the rest.
4. UK military bases - no sea or airspace given to them. If this happens we will end up with another 2 countries on the island. One in Dekelia and one in Akrotiri.
I am not sure if all the above can change in the current environment - the only people that can change the above are the TCs if they revolt against Turkey and ask for these changes so as to be a solution. The power/decision making though is with the Turkish Military and I am not sure that the TCs can do this. However, I believe that 1,3, and 4 can be changed if both the GC and TCs demand it and maybe put a deadline, say 2015 when the Guarantee Agreement cease to exist.
On the second part of your question regarding eoka b, yes there have been atrocities by those thags and Tcs are right to complain about it. These people followed their own agenda and more should have been done to be dealt with. Don't forget though that when Makarios asked Greece to withraw all the Greek officers and army from Cyprus in 1974, the Greek Junta's response was to organise the 15 July coup. Nobody says that TC people did not suffer at the time, however, they suffered from 2 enemies, eoka b and the tmt as well. There are well documented executions of TCs that did not align themselves with the tmt agenda - Kavazoglou is one of them. Also don't forget that eoka b killed more GCs than it did TCs. I consider both these terrorist organisations as being the long arms of Greece and Turkey but also of CIA in Cyprus and against the interests of all Cypriot people and RoC in general.
What Askimows has mentioned above is only some of the deficiencies of the final version(s) of the Annan plan. There are some other ones even more serious and unacceptable for the GC side, pertaining to philosophy of the final political arrangement. Whereas the initial version(s) of the plan (even though unlike the final version they were not fully completed) were based on a philosophy that resembled more to a federal State arrangement, with balanced bi-zonality and bi-communality characteristics; the later version(s) (thanks to the scandalous idea of introducing a so-called virgin birth approach,) shifted dramatically and were based on a philosophy that resembled more to a confederative arrangement between two separate and “legitimately pre-existing nation-states,” with very strong bi-zonality and bi-communality characteristics.
This shifting was done gradually, from version to version, and essentially (in the spirit of the “final” plan,) for the sake expediency, the RoC -from a recognized nation-state with de-jure sovereignty over the entire island and all its people, was silently and indirectly de-legitimized from its existing international status and was demoted to a mere Greek Cypriot state representing only the GCs and the south non-occupied areas; and the Turkish occupation regime in the north (“TRNC”) was silently legitimized and promoted to a Turkish Cypriot State on the basis of the same occupied territory that would represent and belong only to the TC community (and the settlers,) as if the north 29% of Cyprus was the Turkish Cypriot’s exclusive and historically inherited part of Cyprus, alone, and as if no Turkish invasion, ethnic cleansing of the majority of the population there (Greek Cypriots,) occupation and colonization from Turkey ever occurred.
What this would have meant in practice was firstly the effective brushing aside and eradication of the Greek Cypriot’s existential, cultural and historical rights associated with the north part of their country, as if they have never been the indigenous and lawful inhabitants of the north before their ethnic cleansing by Turkey in 1974, and the legalization of the assumption that the Turkish Cypriot community, alone, was historically the exclusive owner of the north 29% of Cyprus; contrary to any and all senses of the historical realities. The limiting by the plan’s provisions Greek Cypriots that would have been allowed and would have chosen to return in the north, would have been regarded and treated as mere immigrants (new-comers) into a foreign country, more or less just like a Polish or any other EU national would come and settle anywhere in Cyprus, with limited cultural and political rights (unless s/he would accept his /her Turkification after a number of years, since the North federal state would essentially legally function and an autonomous mini-Turkish Republic.) Unlike the GC indigenous population that would return in the north, the mainland Turkish settlers that were illegally allowed to colonize the north of Cyprus would almost all have been regarded as fully fletched legitimate citizens of the North State (and Cyprus,) enjoying full political and cultural rights from day one, as if they were the indigenous people of the north of Cyprus since time and memorial. Property rights would have been "settled" on the basis of expediency and primarily if not exclusivelly in favor of the properties' current legitimate but also in favor of all the illegitimate (the majority) current occupiers, with the end result of turning the TC community members (plus the mainland colonizers) from (since even before 1960) having been the owners of the average 17% of the private land in Cyprus, to becoming the "legal" or "legitimate" owners (or in absolute control) of the 24% of the most expensive (representing almost 40% of all the potential real-estate value) of Cyprus’s total private land.
These are just a few of the “side-effects” of this expedient arrangement. The myth that the EU studied the plan and approved it as a balanced and legitimate arrangement, is another scandalous and brain insulting assumption and /or claim. What the EU has basically only "said" is that as long as the trick occurs before Cyprus’s EU accession, and the crime is already "pre-legalized," I am willing to accommodate it (for the sake expediency) as an EU primary law (i.e. a unique situation that pre-existed in the acceding country and which was accepted by the EU as the fact of the matter pertaining to that country alone –just like the case of Latvia and it’s 40% of Russian speaking population that were not regarded by the country as it’s citizens because they couldn’t speak the official language.) If the case was any different, then why all the rush, the agony, the pressure and the anguish to get the Annan plan-5 passed even until the 24 hours minus 5 minutes before Cyprus’s EU accession. If the Annan plan was in compliance with legitimacy, human rights, international legality and EU principles and values, then why all the rush to have it quickly and swiftly adopted before accession. The reason is simple and obvious. You can commit such a trick and a crime to a small and a weak country and its people, but you cannot easily do so to an EU member state.
What kills me most is not to hear the above cynical claims by the foreigners and the Turkish side. What kills me most is to hear these so-called EU approval claims from the mouth of some Greek Cypriots, who in the absence of any stronger arguments as to why we should have accepted the final version of the A-plan, repeat the above same nonsense!
) raised objections on the functionality of the plan, demanding changes on how the economy works, the members of the presidential council etc.
