The time for bitterness is past. The sky has cleared somewhat over the situation in Cyprus, and as a Member State of the European Union, although there are certain fundamental issues, which I raised in this column on 5 May, still waiting for clear answers. The positive element lies within the positions taken by the Greek-Cypriot authorities and in statements by representatives of political forces and civil society, affirming that the rejection of the Annan plan by three-quarters of the population of the Republic of Cyprus should not be taken as a rejection of the island's reunification, and not even of the plan as a whole, just of certain specific parts of it. President Tassos Papadopoulos made this clear as soon as the result of the referendum was announced. Here is the entire text of his statement: "The people of Cyprus, with a full sense of their historical responsibility regarding their future and their duty to safeguard the implementation of a functional and viable settlement for future generations, did not accept the proposed solution plan. The people did not say no to the solution. They said no to this particular plan. We want the reunification of Cyprus and the two communities in conditions of security, with human rights and fundamental freedoms safeguarded".
This statement didn't go down all that well, because it was well known that Mr Papadopoulos had done his utmost to make sure that the plan was rejected, with arguments that bore little relation to human rights and fundamental freedoms. Special envoys of the European press told of a misinformation campaign based on very different arguments than those in the President's statement: the public was told that the Annan plan would have stopped the Cypriot fleet from sailing freely through the Bosphoros Strait, that all Turkish settlers would have remained on the island, that one-third of all civil servants would lose their job if reunification took place... We know that Commissioner Günter Verheugen and the UN representative complained that they were not allowed to speak on Cypriot television. But the time for bitterness has gone, Mr Verheugen himself pointed out that in their time, the Turks were accountable for the lack of solution, and the trend will in future be not to consider the failure as definitive, and to look for a solution allowing the scenario of the whole island joining the EU to be a reality, rather than a legal fiction. To use the rather fashionable terminology, time for "positive reasoning".
The example was set by European Parliament rapporteur Jacques Poos, Luxembourg Socialist, who told the 4th May plenary in Strasbourg: "I remain convinced that the Greek Cypriots and the Turkish Cypriots can, and want to, live together. Where there is a will, there is a way. This way is renewed inter-community dialogue under the aegis of the European Union. If the referendum failed this could be because the voters felt rushed and the time for explanations was too short, and it was monopolised by nationalist slogans. Now, the Cypriots must turn towards an in-depth debate on their common future. I therefore appeal to the Commission and the Council to draw a line under legitimate deception. We must not remain inactive. We must take the initiative once again, because the unification of Cyprus is now a European issue".
A statement which goes a long way. I get the impression that Mr Poos's short statement goes further than it may appear to. By affirming that the reunification of Cyprus is now a "European issue", and that dialogue between the two Turkish communities should take place under the watchful eye of the EU, he is delicately raising the issue of whether it is justified for armed forced of two countries (Greece and Turkey) to stay on Cypriot soil indefinitely (even if there are plans for their presence to be scaled down gradually), and for Turkey to keep a "right of intervention" if the constitutional order is not respected in the future. As a member of the Union, Cyprus will have European guarantees, including, when the time comes, the solidarity and "common defence" clauses (provided in the draft Constitution), and will be bound by European commitments on human rights, minority rights, etc. Is this not enough? Wouldn't the Annan plan have to be revised on the presence of foreign armed forces? And couldn't a control mechanism be envisaged on the number of Turkish settlers allowed to stay on the island, and the effective departure of the rest?
These prospects obviously presuppose that all the citizens of the unified island share the profound feeling of being Cypriots before being Greeks or Turks. Their fellow citizens are the Cypriots of the other ethnic community, not the citizens of Greece or of Turkey, across the sea. This is one of the points I raised on 5 May. It is an important one, because otherwise, the prospects change.
(F.R.)