His positions on the Cyprus issue were made public on Friday by presidential candidate Nikos Christodoulides. It is a text that is a monument to complete ignorance or even disgust of the current situation, but above all it reflects the unrealistic perception of a candidate who aspires to govern and negotiate, as he claims, to solve the problem.
Beyond the messianic approaches, with the candidate identified the tendency within the Greek Cypriots that the discussions between us on the content of the solution “led many times internally to counterproductive discussions, endless conflicts and exhaustive confrontations”, so we need a savior to normalize the dialogue between us, the presidential candidate presents a document on the Cyprus issue in which key components of the negotiation are ignored. decades that led us to the Guterres framework, to which we should return, as noted by Nicos Anastasiades, the negotiator and at least three parties, DISY, AKEL, but also cooperating with Nikos Christodoulides DYPA.
The long-term continues
In the seven-page text on the Cyprus problem, Nikos Christodoulides attempts to restore elements that lead to another long-term struggle. It is noted in the text on the Cyprus problem: “Our primary objective and highest priority is the resumption of substantive negotiations aimed at resolving the Cyprus problem through UN resolutions. High-level agreements, the European acquis, are the framework for negotiation when talks resume.” With this leap of time backward, Nikos Christodoulides in essence brings the negotiation back to the starting point, ignoring that all these years the negotiation has reached its peak and the whole nexus of this time-consuming result was recorded in the context of the secretary general regardless of the causes and narratives that have been heard and that led to the interruption of the talks in Crans Montana.
But what does the reader read in Nikos Christodoulides’ positions on the Cyprus problem, which, in fact, were prepared through “an unprecedented exercise in participatory democracy” and “formed on the basis of dialogue with civil society”, as the presidential candidate constantly claims?
“Understanding that what has been put on the table by the UN secretary-general remains, the Guterres framework, with its positives and negatives, therefore it will also be part of the framework of the negotiation.”
In short, the result of a negotiation, in which all those involved participated through the long experience of the international actor, for Nikos Christodoulides and his partners is not considered to be the pivotal turn but the turn at will and by choice to elements that we like, returning to the general framework of the summit agreements of ’77 and ’79 in which there was not even a reference to the critical issues of the troops or the abolition of the Guarantee.
Of course, it should be noted that the Anastasiades-Eroglou agreements, which in fact were the beginning of the last attempt on the Cyprus issue, are also ignored in the Christodoulides positions.
The convenient approach
However, the reference in the Christodoulides position paper to the “positives and negatives of the Guterres framework” is indicative. A convenient approach is when the candidate avoids dealing with the substance because his partners do not allow him to do so. It is interesting for the candidate to explain to us which in his estimation are the positives that we will get but also what are the negatives of the framework that we will reject. In short, for the President-designate, the secretary-general’s framework that was prepared, with the unprecedented involvement at parallel negotiating tables in which the European Union also participated, is part of the negotiation and not the result of it. The presidential candidate does not want or cannot understand that the content of the Guterres framework incorporates all the previous courses of negotiations and is the only and the last to build on all the frameworks and agreements that have existed in the past.
The logic of the document presented by Nikos Christodoulides does not deviate from the repeated practice of the late Tassos Papadopoulos that “everything is on the table from the moment it has been set” and that “nothing goes away”. In fact, it was a shrewd way in which dialogue was at a constant standstill. It would be really interesting for Christodoulides to explain to the voters how he will negotiate when he invokes and maximizes agreements that were made 45 years ago and which made no reference to a bizonal bicommunal federation.
The solution framework
His positions on the Cyprus issue are inspired by N.H.’s desire to keep things as they are on the basis of the timeless positions of his partners. In these positions, there is a pervasive attempt to satisfy the dismissive forces that support him by ignoring important elements, such as political equality, which he virtually eliminates from his positions. In conclusion, the presidential candidate through the text on the Cyprus problem that he released ignores the existence of the Guterres framework which does not appear as the document to which reference is made:
• The need to terminate the unilateral intervention right and the Treaty of Guarantee.
• On the need for “a drastic reduction of troops from day one while referring to a timetable to reach the number of troops of 1960”.
These include being mentioned in the secretary-general’s context as a result of the 2017 talks in Crans Montana. In short, there is everything that the candidate and his partners are asking for. The Secretary-General’s framework is not one that will be incorporated into agreements of the past. It is the framework for the solution of the Cyprus problem. The rests are rumors and the alchemy of the candidate and his associates.
