Post: #9
Title: Re: التحية للرفاق القبارصة
Author: Mohamed Omer
Date: 02-26-2008, 00:16 AM
Parent: #1
A new will in Nicosia
By electing Demetris Christofias as president, Greek Cypriots have taken an implicit step towards the island's reunification. Will they go the distance?
Helena Smith
The Guardian
February 25, 2008
Finally, after five bleak years of scaremongering, Turk-bashing and prevarication, the Greeks Cypriots have a new president. Demetris Christofias, the burly Soviet-educated "man of the people" has pulled off the double feat of becoming the war-divided island's first communist leader in history and the 27-nation EU bloc's first communist head of state
Barely had the veteran 61-year-old politician digested the scale of his victory over his conservative rival, Ioannis Kasoulides, than tributes to his ability to re-unite Cyprus started pouring in. From the British foreign secretary, David Miliband, who spoke of "a renewed sense of hope", to European Commission head, José Manuel Barroso who saw the election result as the best opportunity yet "to overcome the longstanding stalemate", a wave of rare optimism and excitement has suddenly exploded on the Cyprus scene
Even the Turkish Cypriot leader, Mehmet Ali Talat, wasted no time enthusing that a solution to the 34-year-old division of the island was, at last, in sight. It was feasible, he said, that, with the moderate Christofias on the opposite side of the negotiating table, this fractured corner of the Levant could be put back together again "by the end of 2008"
That Cyprus is at a crucial turning point cannot be denied. The Greeks Cypriots, the island's majority population, have clearly understood that time is an enemy; that with each passing year, the sandbagged, bullet-riddled, UN-patrolled "dead zone" that has separated them from Turkish Cypriots since the summer of 1974, becomes ever more permanent, a grim reminder of a war lost and more than a third of their land taken with it
More than ever, on both sides of the inhospitable divide, the citizens of Cyprus are tired. And in the case of the Greek Cypriots, who, nearly four years ago, so roundly rejected a UN reunification plan at the behest of the now-ousted nationalist leader Tassos Papadopoulos, there is clearly a desire to be given a second chance
In a year free of elections, or any other potentially costly political event in Nicosia, Athens or Ankara, 2008 offers an excellent opportunity to break the deadlock. Because of his AKEL party's traditionally good ties with the trade union movement in Cyprus' breakaway northern republic, Demetris Christofias has better relations with the Turkish Cypriots than any other Greek Cypriot politician
But the communist will have his work cut out for him. Within hours of his victory, Turkey, which bankrolls the pariah state, was quick to point out that AKEL had won the poll with the strategic support of Papadopoulos' no-compromise DIKO party, which necessarily raised the question of whether it would pursue the same hardline policies with "a different face"
After decades of false hopes, diplomats in Nicosia say both the UN and Brussels have no desire to go on "talking about talks". This time, they want to see a real commitment by both sides to get into the substance of the problem before they commit to funding further costly negotiations. Most agree that it is now up to the Greek Cypriots to make the first gesture - one that would restore their credibility and demonstrate that, after five wasted years, they truly want a solution
Christofias would do well to move ahead with the implementation of a confidence-building measure, such as consenting to demilitarise the ceasefire line that cuts though Nicosia. On either side of this ever-septic strip soldiers still face each other over gun barrels. The potential for it all to turn nasty is never far away
Of course, there are still major obstacles to overcome. The issues of governance, security, territory and property remain paramount in the quest for a workable "bi-zonal, bi-communal federation" on the island. And much will also depend on Turkey, which maintains some 40,000 troops in the north and whose own EU ambitions have been directly linked with success on Cyprus
But if a solution is reached, if Christofias and Talat can bite the bullet and accept a compromise, Cyprus may yet emerge as a model of co-habitation and co-existence between two ethnic peoples in one of the world's more incendiary flashpoints
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