Our View: Both leaders playing the same game – preserving the status quo

If the Cyprus problem could be solved with platitudes, political gimmicks and the repetition of slogans, President Nikos Christodoulides would have finalised the settlement months ago. These are the tools he has used ever since his election and his declaration that a Cyprus settlement was his number one priority because the status quo was unsustainable.

He has a ready-made answer, however, for preserving the unsustainable status quo and it goes by the name of Ersin Tatar – the inflexible leader of the Turkish Cypriots who labours under the illusion that by saying nothing other than repeating his demand for separate sovereignty ad nauseam, he will eventually be offered a two-state solution on a plate.

In a sense, the two leaders are playing a similar game, one that will preserve the status quo as the effortless, default solution they would both be happy with. Christodoulides thus avoids taking any tough and unpopular decisions that will make him the target of abusive criticism from a section of the population, while Tatar will have achieved all his objectives apart from recognition of his entity, which was always unrealistic.

The only difference between the two is that Tatar is not being dishonest to the Turkish Cypriot about his aims in the way Christodoulides is with the Greek Cypriots who have been served nothing more than platitudes. The latest was a laughable proposal about the three tables at the negotiations and who would be represented at each one. This was reportedly made at the October 15 dinner and was leaked to the press earlier in the week.

It was sold as the president’s idea for getting round the objections of the Turkish side to the participation of Britain, as a guarantor power, in the talks about the troops. Christodoulides proposed that one table, at which security and troops would be discussed the two sides plus Greece and Turkey would sit. At the table discussing guarantees Britain would also be invited, while at the third table, dealing with internal aspects, only the two sides would be present. The UN would be at all tables, although it is unclear with how many chairs.

Tatar had vetoed the idea at the dinner, so why had Christodoulides camp leaked it to the press via the national council? So that Tatar could publicly state that he had not agreed to this proposal or to make gullible Greek Cypriots believe that the president was being pro-active and looking for a way forward? In the event, all that Tatar agreed to was for the two sides, Greece and Turkey to meet, not to negotiate about anything at different tables but to establish if there was common ground for negotiations; and Britain would not be invited.

The talk about the three tables is just another political gimmick, made because it will lead nowhere but support the narrative that he is taking a positive and constructive approach, which stumbles on Turkey’s intransigence. The very idea that he would come up with suggestions on how negotiations, which the other side has not even agreed to, should be conducted is plainly silly. Has he now decided he will help the UN secretary-general do his job as part of his theatrical efforts to solve the Cyprus problem?

Meanwhile, government spokesman, Konstantinos Letymbiotis, after Tuesday’s national council meeting, said the president had written to the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres thanking him for his initiative, and noting that the “broadened conference should be called as soon as possible, after the necessary preparation has been made”. He had even set a time frame. “The aim we have set is for the broadened meeting to be called before the end of the year,” said Letymbiotis.

Apart from the number of tables, there is also disagreement about who will attend the broadened meeting. Greek Cypriot negotiator Menelaos Menelaou, after meeting his Turkish Cypriot counterpart, said that Britain had to attend the ‘informal’ meeting, because the international aspects of the Cyprus problem had to be discussed by all parties. But will the international aspects be discussed at this meeting, at which the two sides and the so-called mother countries will try to find common ground – agreement on the form of settlement – that would lead to a new process?

Right from the start, Christodoulides has been engaging in Cyprus problem negotiations in the media, the objective being, not as he claims, to resume negotiations, but in order to use the rejections of the obliging Tatar to prove to Greek Cypriots that he is blameless for the deadlock and partition. His Cyprus problem policy is strictly a communications exercise designed to maintain the ‘unsustainable’ status quo while winning the blame game he supposedly refuses to play. He is not concerned that his victories in this game serve only to consolidate partition, with not a square metre of occupied land being returned to the Greek Cypriot side.

The output of platitudes, however, continues. A couple of days ago, speaking about his number one priority, Christodoulides said: “We remain committed to our goal, we are working methodically with a very clear orientation, with an assertive realism, with solid arguments, we know very well where we want to go.”