Cyprus-Forum.com

[Kifeas]

The Divisions of Cyprus
by Perry Anderson

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v30/n08/ande01_.html

A Cyprus issue perspective by a world widely very well known and respected British intellectual.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perry_Anderson

[Piratis]

Thats a very good article describing the whole recent history of Cyprus.

[miltiades]

Particularly revealing the following piece .


""""When the whip was cracked, it came steel-tipped. ‘A few riots in Ankara would do us nicely,’ an official in the Foreign Office had noted. In September 1955, as Cyprus was being discussed at a three-power conference in London, the Turkish secret police planted a bomb at the house where Kemal Ataturk was born in Salonica. At the signal of this ‘Greek provocation’, mobs swarmed through Istanbul looting Greek businesses, burning Orthodox churches, and attacking Greek residents. Although no one in official circles in London doubted that the pogrom was unleashed by the Turkish government, Macmillan – in charge of the talks – pointedly did not complain.

Internal developments lent a hand to this external lever. Ready enough to kill Communists, Grivas had given EOKA strict instructions not to attack Turks, whom he had no wish to antagonise, but to target Greek collaborators with the British, above all in the police. Under EOKA pressure, their number rapidly dwindled. To replace them, Harding recruited Turks, and added a Police Mobile Reserve, dipping for the purpose into the lumpen element in the Turkish community

[miltiades]

He goes on to say :

""""Over the next four years, his National Organisation of Cypriot Fighters – EOKA – waged a guerrilla war of lethal efficacy, which London never succeeded in stamping out. By the end, Grivas had pinned down some 28,000 British troops with a force of not much more than two hundred men: a feat made possible – his own gifts as a commander were quite limited – only by the breadth of support the national cause enjoyed among the population. As a purely military performance, the EOKA campaign was perhaps the most successful of all anti-colonial resistances in the postwar period.""""

[bilako22]

He goes on to say :

""""Over the next four years, his National Organisation of Cypriot Fighters – EOKA – waged a guerrilla war of lethal efficacy, which London never succeeded in stamping out. By the end, Grivas had pinned down some 28,000 British troops with a force of not much more than two hundred men: a feat made possible – his own gifts as a commander were quite limited – only by the breadth of support the national cause enjoyed among the population. As a purely military performance, the EOKA campaign was perhaps the most successful of all anti-colonial resistances in the postwar period.""""

I can tell that you Greek guys miss EOKA Grivas.

[Oracle]

Thanks Kifeas.

For newbies and non-historians like myself this article is concise and well explained. Is it a summary of a book?

There are some profound statements which lend encouragement, but also add to the frustration as to why Cyprus is denied the justice it deserves.

The breakdown of the Annan plan was particularly refreshing:

Hannay was not wrong in remarking – he was in a position to do so – that, for all the jungle of technical modifications that developed across its five versions, the essence of the ‘Annan’ plan remained unaltered throughout. It contained three fundamental elements. The first prescribed the state that would come into being. The Republic of Cyprus, as internationally recognised for forty years – repeatedly so by the UN itself – would be abolished, along with its flag, anthem and name. In its stead, a wholly new entity would be created, under another name, composed of two constituent states, one Greek and the other Turkish, each vested with all powers in its territory, save those – principally concerned with external affairs and common finance – reserved for a federal level. There a senate would be divided 50:50 between Greeks and Turks, a lower chamber elected on a proportionate basis, with a guaranteed 25 per cent for Turks. There would be no president, but an executive council, composed of four Greeks and two Turks, elected by a ‘special majority’ requiring two-fifths of each half of the senate to approve the list. In case of deadlock, a supreme court composed of three Greeks, three Turks and three foreigners would assume executive and legislative functions. The central bank would likewise have an equal number of Greek and Turkish directors, with a casting vote by a foreigner.

[Oracle]

The clarity of the rights and wrongs is so obvious, once explained so well.

Only seasoned liars can continue to deny the extent of wrongs imposed on Cyprus by Turkey and its co-executioners.

It's hard to resist from re-quoting sections of this fine article (so I won't resist ... unless I'm faced with wrath again )

Still on the Annan plan:

At their core lies a ratification of ethnic cleansing, of a scale and thoroughness that has been the envy of settler politics in Israel, where Avigdor Lieberman – leader of the far right Yisrael Beiteinu, now the fifth largest party in the Knesset – publicly calls for a ‘Cypriot solution’ on the West Bank, a demand regarded as so extreme that it is disavowed by all his coalition partners. Not only does the plan absolve Turkey from any reparations for decades of occupation and plunder, imposing their cost instead on those who suffered them. It is further in breach of the Geneva Convention, which forbids an occupying power to introduce settlers into conquered territory. Far from compelling their withdrawal, the plan entrenched their presence: no one ‘will be forced to leave’, in Pfirter’s words. So little did legal norms matter in the conception of the plan, that care was taken to remove its provisions from the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights and Court of Justice in advance.

No less contemptuous of the principles of any existent democracy, the plan accorded a minority of between 18 and 25 per cent of the population 50 per cent of the decision-making power in the state. To see how grotesque such a proposal was, it is enough to ask how Turkey would react if it were told that its Kurdish minority – also around 18 per cent – must be granted half of all seats in its Senate, sweeping rights to block action in its executive, not to speak of some 30 per cent of its land area under its exclusive jurisdiction. What UN or EU emissary, or apologist for the Annan Plan among the multitude in the Western media, would dare travel to Ankara with such a scheme in his briefcase? Ethnic minorities need protection – Turkish Kurds, by any measure, considerably more than Turkish Cypriots – but to make of this a flagrant political disproportion is to invite hostility, rather than restrain it.

[miltiades]

He goes on to say :

""""Over the next four years, his National Organisation of Cypriot Fighters – EOKA – waged a guerrilla war of lethal efficacy, which London never succeeded in stamping out. By the end, Grivas had pinned down some 28,000 British troops with a force of not much more than two hundred men: a feat made possible – his own gifts as a commander were quite limited – only by the breadth of support the national cause enjoyed among the population. As a purely military performance, the EOKA campaign was perhaps the most successful of all anti-colonial resistances in the postwar period.""""

I can tell that you Greek guys miss EOKA Grivas.

If you bother to learn something read the entire article you will then see that EOKA was not what appears in propaganda trash but an organization of freedom fighters who were instructed by their leader not to "antagonise " the T/Cs , a fact because I was around at the time and the only enemies of EOKA apart from the British troops were the collaborators , an inevitable event in all struggles.
As you will see the propaganda that EOKA was a bunch of murderers (HERE WE MEAN THE ORIGINAL EOKA NOT SUBSEQUENT BASTARDISED DIVERSIONS ) does not stand up to serious scrutiny .
The T/Cs were never seen as a target , that came much later when the British implemented their favourite colonial weapon , divide and rule . They encouraged conflict along ethnic lines .

[Kikapu]

Thanks Kifeas,

I have just copied the article, all 41 pages of it to read it later today, but everything I've read about the Annan Plan in this article this morning is spot on and these are the reasons as to why the 2004 AP was going to be a bigger disaster for Cypriots in the near future than our present situation. It is time for all Cypriots, TC's and GC's to map out their own "road map" for the future of the island and it's citizens as one country, one nation and one people, and the way to achieve that, is by addressing each others concerns in an honest way without one imposing their will over the other in an unfair or undemocratic ways.

It is time for all the NeoPartitionist and NeoNationalist to see this reality, and work towards peace and unity rather than hatred and division.

Peace and harmony is the only way forward.

[miltiades]

Thanks Kifeas,

I have just copied the article, all 41 pages of it to read it later today, but everything I've read about the Annan Plan in this article this morning is spot on and these are the reasons as to why the 2004 AP was going to be a bigger disaster for Cypriots in the near future than our present situation. It is time for all Cypriots, TC's and GC's to map out their own "road map" for the future of the island and it's citizens as one country, one nation and one people, and the way to achieve that, is by addressing each others concerns in an honest way without one imposing their will over the other in an unfair or undemocratic ways.

It is time for all the NeoPartitionist and NeoNationalist to see this reality, and work towards peace and unity rather than hatred and division.

Peace and harmony is the only way forward.

PEACE AND HARMONY IS THE ONLY WAY FORWARD !!!