Relations between Cyprus's Greeks and Turks have become relatively congenial, writes MICHAEL JANSEN
CYPRUS, THE birthplace of Greek goddess Aphrodite, assumed the rotating presidency of the EU last weekend.
For Cyprus, this is a first shot at the presidency as the island republic, along with nine others, joined the bloc only in 2004, while Ireland was in charge. The grand expansion ceremonies in Dublin, attended by all EU leaders, were a high point in the history of the Cyprus republic, which gained independence from Britain in 1960.
After 82 years of British rule, Cyprus was troubled and under-developed but a haven for European tourists who flocked to its beach resorts.
Divisions between the 82 per cent majority-Greek community and 18 per cent minority-Turkish community were exploited by their motherlands, prompting bouts of violence. Ankara promoted separatism among Turkish Cypriots while Greek Cypriots looked to unreliable Athens for support.
In 1974, the Athens military junta sponsored a coup against Cypriot president Mikhail Makarios. Ankara responded by invading and occupying the northern 36 per cent of the island and expelling all but a few hundred Greek Cypriots.
Turkey took control of 70 per cent of the island’s productive capacity: citrus plantations, manufacturing plants, hotels and beach resorts.
Two-fifths of Greek Cypriots became refugees in the south. The community pulled together and worked hard to recover from the disaster. They adopted a policy of self-reliance and austerity and began to recover.
On November 15th, 1983, following the failure of reunification negotiations between the two communities, the Turkish Cypriots issued a unilateral declaration of independence. The breakaway Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is recognised only by Turkey, which has maintained up to 35,000 troops there and settled tens of thousands of its own citizens in the north, in violation of international law.
The internationally recognised Cyprus republic has prospered, developing as a financial services and off-shore business centre in the eastern Mediterranean, a link between Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.
Cyprus applied for membership of the European Community, as it was then known, on July 4th, 1990, and nearly eight years later launched accession negotiations with what had become the EU, the community’s successor.
In 2003-2004 a last-ditch effort by then UN secretary general Kofi Annan failed to reunify the island ahead of Cyprus’s EU entry. The EU granted membership to the whole of the island and all its citizens, taking the position that the Turkish-occupied north was territory outside the control of the legitimate government. Nevertheless, Cyprus became the first divided country to join the bloc; Nicosia, the world’s last divided capital, became the EU’s first and only partitioned capital.
In 2008 newly-elected president Demetris Christofias and former Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat launched a fresh round of unification talks. At the outset, there was some optimism because the two men were lefists who had developed a friendship through contacts between their communities’ trade unions. But after Talat was replaced by hardliner Dervis Eroglu in 2010, the talks did not prosper.
Today the population of the island is 952,000: 681,000 Greek Cypriots, 90,000 Turkish Cypriots, and 181,000 foreign residents. There are also an estimated 150-160,000 mainland Turkish settlers living in the north, outnumbering the indigenous Turkish Cypriots.
In spite of the division, relations between the two communities have become relatively congenial since Turkey opened the border in 2002 and allowed Greek and Turkish Cypriots to cross the line and meet. More than 50,000 Turkish Cypriots have taken passports issued by the republic and several thousand have jobs in the south where wages are higher than in the north.
After the talks failed, the Turkish Cypriot authorities threatened to implement a unilateral “Plan B” by campaigning for recognition of the north as an independent “Turkish Cypriot State” and to boycott the EU during the Cypriot presidency. Turkey, which remains wedded to a two-state solution to the Cyprus dispute, has also threatened to annex northern Cyprus.
The EU presidency is, after all, a reaffirmation of the existence of one Cyprus.