OPINION

Turkish revisionism

…The most essential difference in the new phase of exploratory talks between Greece and Turkey lies in the fact that Ankara, in the intervening years since the invasion of the island in 1974, shaped a clearly revisionist policy, both on the Cyprus issue and the Aegean Sea. As for the Cyprus problem, Turkey’s revisionist policy was expressed when Turkish-Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash told US mediator Richard Holbrooke that a solution has to take into consideration the «reality» that there are «two states» on Cyprus and, therefore, the UN Security Council resolutions referring to a bizonal and bicommunal federation on Cyprus have no binding effect. About 10 days ago, Turkish Foreign Minister Ismail Cem sent a memorandum to his EU counterparts, the UN secretary-general and the permanent members of the Security Council in which he argued that the multiethnic entities were heading toward dissolution and that a solution should aim to create a single state entity (meaning a confederation), but with two states on the island and to recognize the existence of two peoples and two religions. It is obvious that there is a clear inconsistency between the prevailing «good climate» and the systematic efforts to legalize the outcome of the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974.

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