President Akıncı: “We are not going to wait with our hands tied in the Eastern Mediterranean”

Stating that the Greek Cypriot side should show a cooperative approach instead of continuing the unilateral initiatives and trying to own the natural wealth in the Mediterranean alone, President Akıncı said: “We are not going to wait with our hands tied in respect of not getting any positive response to all our calls”.

Akıncı made an evaluation to AA correspondent ahead of his meeting with the Greek Cypriot leader Nikos Anastasiades tomorrow.

Stating that Anastasiades was not able to put forward any concrete opinion at the meeting on 26 October, 2018 regarding the proposal to expand the powers of the constituent states, Akıncı said that the Turkish Cypriot side is sincerely ready to handle the issues which the Greek Cypriot leader may suggest on this issue adding that they are ready to listen to the opinions he may have.

Mentioning that the UN Secretary General’s Temporary Envoy on Cyprus Jane Holl Lute who has been in contact with the parties for a while, searched whether the parties have a common vision of the future of Cyprus or not, Akıncı continued:

“Lute continues to work on creating reference concepts for the negotiation process to start on a common ground. It is not yet clear what kind of a conclusion will be reached from these studies, and it does not seem so easy to form such a common analysis because of the attitude of the Greek Cypriot side. However, there is no expectation of progress before June because there are some outside elections due to take place. If Lute’s work on the search for common ground results in a positive conclusion, and a consensus can be reached on a common text that is expected to be the starting point, we assume it might be in June.”

Expressing that whatever the solution will be in Cyprus, political equality is inevitable for the Turkish Cypriots Akıncı said: ‘If we look at the statements of the Greek Cypriot Leader in media, if the Greek Cypriots make the decisions with the majority in the institutions in which Turkish Cypriots will be represented too, this is called a unitary state and envisages minority rights for the Turkish Cypriots.

There is no Turkish Cypriot leader who will accept that. If the Greek Cypriot Leader prefers a model which has very limited central authorities and there is no need for taking decisions together, this is different to a federation and it can be evaluated as a confederation or two separate states. Is this what Greek Cypriot people ask for? The Greek Cypriot Leadership must make it clear. If their approach is to divert more powers to constituent states and limit the power of the centre, then Turkish Cypriots must have political equality, equal votes and the right to be included in making the decisions. Anything different is unacceptable.