Pavlos Xanthoulis
Nine months ago, last May, President Christodoulides was celebrating the appointment of Johannes Hahn as the Commission’s envoy for Cyprus. He created the impression that the Austrian former Commissioner, acting on behalf of the EU, would be in a position to stir the stagnant waters of the Cyprus problem, which for roughly eight years has been in substantive deadlock. In Mr. Hahn, President Christodoulides saw the EU’s “more active involvement” toward a Cyprus settlement, as well as the “utilization of the European toolbox,” just as he has been promising us for more than three years now. In the exact same tone in which he is now promising, within the framework of the State of the Union 2026, to strengthen the footprint of the Cypriot state through the exercise of foreign policy.
The facts, however, were always different from Nicosia’s expectations. After all, as we have repeatedly pointed out, the EU’s involvement in the Cyprus issue would merely be supportive of any potential UN initiative. And therefore, the terminology of “more active involvement” deployed by President Christodoulides belonged to the realm of wishful thinking. Meanwhile, the so-called utilization of the European toolbox, meaning the Euro-Turkish dossiers invoked by our President, and parroted by close associates of his into the eager ears of journalists, could not withstand even the slightest criticism. Because while the President of the Republic claimed that Euro-Turkish dossiers would be placed in the service of a Cyprus settlement, Euro-Turkish relations were acquiring an enviable autonomy, with no meaningful linkage whatsoever to the Cyprus question.
And thus, as we also repeatedly emphasized, Turkey’s Foreign Minister was invited, after many years, to informal Gymnich Councils; the Commission approved facilitations for Turkish citizens in obtaining Schengen visas; high-level Euro-Turkish political dialogues were reactivated and, within that framework, discussions began on upgrading the Customs Union. At the same time, the European Investment Bank is becoming active again in Turkey. All of these “Euro-Turkish dossiers,” which had been frozen due to Turkey’s illegal actions in Cyprus’ EEZ, not only were not deployed as leverage for the Cyprus issue, but were unfrozen with no connection whatsoever to the resolution of the Cyprus problem, as the outcome itself clearly demonstrates. And to arrive at an accurate political sum, we must also take into account the alchemy performed by Cyprus’ partners within the EU, who brought Turkey in through the back door into Europe’s defense and security architecture.
Consequently, however elegantly one might put it, Nicosia’s investment in the European factor as a means of creating conditions for a Cyprus settlement has not delivered. And so, from the utopian ambitions of our government, we land in reality and see the substance of the Cyprus issue replaced by Confidence-Building Measures, with the blessing of the UN itself. With the key feature being that some of the CBMs proposed even by António Guterres tend to contribute to the growing autonomy of the Turkish Cypriot secessionist entity. Exactly as the Turkish side seeks, aiming to create conditions that consolidate the pseudo-state.
And Turkey’s Foreign Ministry, with provocative ease and without feeling the slightest pressure, exploits every given. And taking as a pretext the recent UNFICYP mandate renewal report, it sends a message in every direction, so that both the UN and the uninvolved EU, in which President Christodoulides continues to invest, will fully absorb it, that: “The most realistic solution to the Cyprus issue presupposes the coexistence of two states on the island.” And in light of this position, Turkey “calls on the UN Security Council and the international community to accept this reality, to reaffirm the inherent rights of the Turkish Cypriot people, namely sovereign equality and their equal international status, and to pave the way for a bright future that will be shaped through close cooperation between the two neighboring states on the island…”
So this, then, is “our bright future,” as promised to us by Turkey’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. A “bright future” that simply tends, on the one hand, to formalize our tragic past, as it was carved out by the Turkish invasion and occupation. And on the other, to expand our equally tragic present, as it is being entrenched through our political inadequacy and the announcements of President Christodoulides in the State of the Union.
Read this opinion in its original Greek here.
