WHAT HAS CHANGED ON
CYPRUS?
BY ILTER TURKMEN (HURRIYET)
Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul
yesterday underwent surgery at Gulhane
Military Medical Academy (GATA) for
trauma in his inner ear stemming from an
upper respiratory tract infection and
cabin pressure while returning from
Tunisia, where he paid an official visit
last week. Foreign Ministry spokesman
Namik Tan said that Gul’s situation was
good, but that it was not clear when he
would be discharged. Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited Gul at the
hospital. Gul’s US visit scheduled to
begin this Saturday has been postponed
indefinitely since doctors have advised
him against air travel for some time.
Gul was going to meet with US Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice and UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan and brief
them on Ankara’s recent Cyprus action
plan. /Star/
The government is seeking to avoid
feeding the media frenzy over the
General Staff’s sharply worded statement
on the Semdinli indictment. The
statement was debated during yesterday’s
seven-and-a-half-hour marathon Cabinet
meeting and afterwards, government
spokesman Cemil Cicek declined to answer
questions, saying he had no information
on the issue. Cicek also said that he
hadn’t seen the text of the statement
and that the issue wasn’t debated during
the meeting. Meanwhile, Prime Minister
Recep Tayyip Erdogan reportedly warned
Cabinet ministers not to fuel the
controversy and not to make any comments
on the issue due to its sensitive
nature. /Cumhuriyet/
The General Staff yesterday
declared that there was no need to open
investigations into Land Forces
Commander Gen. Yasar Buyukanit or other
military officers named in the Semdinli
indictment. A statement posted on the
General Staff website says that the
Semdinli indictment prepared by the Van
Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office was
being examined. The General Staff
statement claimed that Ferhat Sarikaya,
the Van chief public prosecutor who
prepared the indictment, had made a
grave “mistake” and overstepped his
authority, adding that Sarikaya might
have been under the influence of
“certain circles.” /Hurriyet/
European Union Commission Turkey
Representative Hansjoerg Kretschmer said
yesterday that Ankara hadn’t taken
necessary steps on judicial reform
during its EU membership bid “There are
steps which should be taken to
strengthen the government and
Parliament’s control over the military,”
he said. “Making the budget of the
Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) transparent
is among our expectations. Turkey should
not rest on its laurels.” Stressing that
the commission’s 2005 report stated that
Turkey had met the EU’s critical
criteria, Kretschmer added, however,
that the report also pointed to a
slowdown in reforms. He said that the
recent reforms were very important and
that they needed to be implemented.
Kretschmer further said it concerned him
that only 55% of the Turkish nation
supports Turkey’s EU bid. /Milliyet/
Malaysian International Trade
and Industry Minister Rafidah Aziz,
currently in Istanbul, yesterday
attended a seminar organized by the
Turkish Union of Chambers and
Commodities Exchanges (TOBB), the
Istanbul Chamber of Commerce (ITO), and
the Foreign Economic Relations Board
(DEIK). Addressing the gathering, Aziz
said that he was visiting countries in
order to create job opportunities,
adding that his next stop would be Egypt
and Saudi Arabia. Stressing that goal of
his visits was to strengthen Malaysia’s
economic and trade ties with members of
the Organization for the Islamic
Conference (OIC), Aziz said that Turkey
was Malaysia’s sixth-largest trade
partner and that Malaysian businesses
were interested in Turkey. He further
called for the Turkish businessmen to
invest in Malaysia since there are many
advantages to investing there. /Turkiye/
Britain’s BBC this week posted a
controversial analysis of Turkey’s
negotiations with the European Union on
its website. “The EU's membership
negotiations with Turkey have barely
started but already worries are
surfacing in Brussels and London that
they could collapse within months,” said
the piece. “No-one thought the talks
would be easy but what is driving such
fears of an early breakdown? The answer
is Cyprus ... Most EU diplomats and
politicians do not want talks with
Turkey to collapse in acrimony. They do
want to see Turkey open its ports to
Greek Cypriot vessels, but they also
want moves to resolve the Cyprus
problem. But the [Greek] Cypriots have
much more bargaining power vis-a-vis
Turkey now they are inside the EU, and
the other EU member states much less
leverage over them. Some diplomats worry
that the Cypriot strategy is to
‘Europeanise’ the Cyprus dispute, moving
the dispute away from a UN framework
where compromise is inevitable.” /Sabah/
The coalition government of the Turkish
Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) is
apparently facing a breakup due to the
lack of an agreement over financial aid
allocated by the European Union to ease
the TRNC’s international isolation.
Turkish Cypriot Foreign Minister Serdar
Denktas has repeatedly said his Democrat
Party (DP) favors rejecting the EU aid.
The EU’s 139 million euros of aid to the
TRNC was approved by the EU Council. But
this aid is bound to three conditions:
the center which will organize the aid
will be established by Greek Cypriots,
Greek Cyprus’ approval will be received
before extending any aid, and the Greek
Cypriot administration will be consulted
before permission is given for any
projects on territories which supposedly
belonged to Greek Cypriots prior to
1974. /Aksam/
Columnist Ilter Turkmen comments on the
Cyprus issue and Turkey’s stance. A
summary of his column is as follows:
“There are both positive developments
and otherwise which are a matter of
concern on the Cyprus issue for Turkey
and the Turkish Republic of Northern
Cyprus (TRNC). Among the positive
developments is a government in the TRNC
which approaches current problems more
realistically, doesn’t close itself off
from the world and is addressed by the
international community. The benefits of
this government’s policies were
important, particularly economically.
The gross national product (GNP) per
capita reached $10,000, and this is the
best proof of this. Although the
construction boom has slowed down, great
projects are still on the way. This
economic growth raised the Turkish
Cypriots’ self-reliance as well. Of
course, there are still political
ambiguities. There’s no hope for a
solution on the horizon, but there are
certain hints. A consensus was reached
to discuss a series of problems which
concern both nations on the technical
level. It’s hoped that these meetings
will raise the mutual confidence and get
the talks restarted. However, as seen
during last week’s Turkish-Greek Forum
meeting in Istanbul, with Greek and
Turkish Cypriot participation, it won’t
be easy to reactivate UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s goodwill
mission. Greek Cypriot participants said
that their leader Tassos Papadopoulos
wasn’t uncompromising as some claim and
that he believes a solution is needed.
But no change of stance has been seen in
the Greek Cypriot leader to make one
think that he will approach a compromise
to maintain the general balance of
Annan’s plan.
There are two problems for the TRNC.
There is, firstly, ending their
isolation. Turkish Cypriots want to
carry out trade from their harbors
freely, their airports opened to
international transportation and
Northern Cyprus integrated into the
Customs Union. The issue of airports is
more important than direct trade,
because not exports, but tourism will be
the engine of sustainable economic
growth. As Greek Cypriots are concerned
that southern Cyprus’ tourism will
migrate to the north, they don’t want
the airports to be opened to
international transportation. As for
direct trade, they want to open Maras to
Greek Cypriot housing under the UN
administration and Magosa harbor to be
used by both parties under the European
Union administration. The first problem
for the TRNC is the issue of real
estate. The members of TRNC Indemnity
Commission will be announced tomorrow
and the commission will start its work.
If the European Court of Human Rights
(ECHR) determines that they comply with
the criteria set by the commission, the
return of property and the case records
will be transferred to the commission.
Greek Cypriots don’t want to believe in
such a possibility and they are seeking
various solutions to put pressure on
Turkey and the TRNC. The biggest problem
for Turkey is the approval and
implementation of the Customs Union
Protocol by the Turkish Parliament.
Actually, the Customs Union has come
into force and it applies to the trade
of goods between the two parties.
However, the EU wants Turkey to open its
harbors to Greek Cypriot ships as part
of the protocol. Turkey isn’t willing to
agree to this as long as the
restrictions on Northern Cypriot sea and
air harbors aren’t removed and won’t
approve the protocol for this reason.
The extent of its impact on the process
of membership talks with EU will be seen
this fall.”
