'Cyprus solution must be based on sovereign equality'

By Fatih Hafiz Mehmet

LEFKOSA, Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (AA) - Any solution for the long-divided island of Cyprus must be based on sovereign equality, said a senior Turkish Cypriot diplomat on Tuesday.

Effective participation and decision-making mechanisms are not enough for a partnership on the island, but “must be based on sovereign equality and when we say sovereign equality, we are basically talking about a confederation," Tahsin Ertugruloglu, former foreign minister of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), said in Lefkosa, the Turkish Cypriot capital.

That means “a partnership of two states, rather than a partnership of two communities,” he added, speaking at Near East University, at the Second International Conference on the Cyprus issue.

Political equality by itself is not enough, as there are two national entities on Cyprus, he said.

"There is no Cypriot nation, my dear friends... ‘Cypriotness’ it is at best a geographic identity," he said.

Ertugruloglu said the Turkish Cypriots had tried to forge a partnership with their Greek Cypriot neighbors but they prevented it.

"If we can’t live together, we will live as neighbors," he stressed.

Ertugruloglu added that Haiti and Dominican Republic are also two states sharing a single island.

Hasan Unal, a political scientist at Istanbul’s Maltepe University, was skeptical that a federation could solve the Cyprus problem, saying in fact it could be “a recipe for disaster."

Unal said even if successful, a federation model would certainly be "a cumbersome, awkward" administration with ethnic quotas, and almost everyone would eventually resent it.

- 'Federation no longer a magic spell'

"The end of the Cold War brought an abrupt end to the legend of federations," said Unal.

Unal said during the Cold War the word federation was a "magic" solution for Western politicians for any multiethnic dispute, including Cyprus.

"Federation is no longer a magic spell," Unal stressed.

Yusuf Kanli, a Cypriot-born journalist, said if the Greek Cypriot side insists that the whole island belongs to it and provides only minority rights to Turkish Cypriots, there can never be a Cyprus deal.

He said the two sides on the island have certain obsessions.

"Irrespective of whether they might be understandable or products of some phobias, these obsessions must be answered adequately, if there will ever be a mutually acceptable solution on the island," Kanli said.

Kanli said the geopolitical importance of the island and eastern Mediterranean is true not only for the two peoples of Cyprus and the countries of the Mediterranean, but also for countries that have economic and political interests and even military aspirations.

In 1974, following a coup aiming at Cyprus’ annexation by Greece, Ankara had to intervene as a guarantor power. In 1983, the TRNC was founded.

The decades since have seen several attempts to resolve the dispute, all ending in failure. The latest one, held with the participation of the guarantor countries -- Turkey, Greece, and the U.K. -- ended in 2017 in Switzerland.

In 2004, in twin referendums, the plan of then UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan was accepted by Turkish Cypriots but rejected by Greek Cypriots.

Talks have focused on a federal model, based on the political equality of the Turkish and Greek Cypriot sides, but Greek Cypriots’ rejection of such a solution, including the Annan plan, led to the emergence of other models.

In a recent report, current UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also said that "new ideas" may be needed for a settlement on the island.