Statements by the General Secretary of the C.C. of AKEL A. Kyprianou
It is obvious that Turkey will escalate its aggressive actions and provocations, and it is for this reason that we must reflect very seriously about how we can address the whole situation as it is evolving. We have submitted our proposal to the session of the National Council and the President of the Republic. We continue to insist that we will find it very difficult to be able to confront Turkey’s aggressive actions if we do not demonstrate our readiness to return to negotiations, provided of course that Turkey’s provocative actions are terminated.
I would like to recall that in the past, whenever we had a protracted deadlock on the Cyprus problem, we subsequently had the attempt by Turkey to provoke new fait accompli. This is still the case today.
What we have been repeatedly saying all through this recent period is that we have warned over the last two years about the possibility of getting to the point we have reached today.
I sincerely regret the fact that the ruling Democratic Rally party is fabricating our own positions that don’t exist so as to reply and try to discredit AKEL. AKEL has proven in practice that it is a patriotic party.
It is a party that puts the interests of Cyprus and the Cypriot people above everything else. We have demonstrated this in practice and not by engaging in slogans and empty words as the ruling Rally party is doing.
At this very moment, AKEL yet again puts how Cyprus’s interests are above all best served. That is to say, by ending Turkey’s provocative actions on the one hand, and on the other hand by resuming negotiations with the aim of solving the Cyprus problem, which is the only way to counter Turkey’s provocations.
Can something happen right now?
In my view, we cannot expect any immediate action. In what sense? We can’t expel the Turkish ships by waging war. I want to remind you that in 2010 when Turkey was threatening in an identical way that it would send ships in the Cypriot Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), the only reason why the international community reacted and backed us was that we were demonstrating our willingness for a solution to the Cyprus problem at the negotiating table – in contrast to what happened in 2014 when the Turkish vessel “Barbaros” was roaming freely on the southern coast of Cyprus because the negotiation procedure was in difficulty.
That is why we are also stating right now that there is one way of dealing effectively with Turkey’s provocative actions. 1) We should state that we are ready to enter into a dialogue with a view to reaching an agreement as soon as possible provided that there is a response from the Turkish side. 2) We should reaffirm the Christofias-Talat Agreement on natural resources and the sharing of the revenues and, 3) of course provided that the precondition that Turkey’s provocative actions in the EEZ of the Republic of Cyprus are terminated.
Only then I believe will we manage to bring the international community as a whole on our side, which should exert the necessary influences on Turkey to put an end to this provocation action. And I wonder frankly why the ruling Democratic Rally party is insisting on saying that what AKEL points out is contradictory. Contradictory to what though?
