.
For 37 years, we were foolish enough to believe that we could rely on such “golden weapons” as United Nations resolutions, words of comradeship from permanent members of the Security Council and hot winded declarations that Greece would rush to our aid any time we needed military support in order to teach Turkey a lesson and put it in its place.
Unfortunately, it is the powers of commerce that seem to determine our destiny and having a hard-line communist leadership does not seem to help.
The political talks are leading nowhere and our European partners are getting fed up with our own inability to get things moving. Although everyone acknowledges that Ankara is at fault for the problem and the lack of progress towards any solution, tiny Cyprus is regarded by many as a thorn in the side of EU-Turkey relations – Britain and paymaster U.S. could not care less about what happens on the island, France and Germany are frustrated for allowing Cyprus to join the EU Club with a political (and now economic) headache, Russia and China use the “sovereignty” and “territorial integrity” of the Republic as the occasional excuse to have a jab at the Americans and NATO, while Greece needs to resolve its own political, economic and military differences with a neighbour it hesitantly wants peace with.
Now we have the U.N. cowering under Turkish orders to suggest that perhaps oil exploration efforts should be postponed, for the time being. And can the State Department’s “strongest affirmations” be taken at all seriously that Washington would not allow American interests to be jeapordised, suggesting that it would protect Noble Energy’s drilling assets?
Our biggest defence lies in our management of the energy game and our closest allies (at least in this case) should be Lebanon, Egypt and the Israelis (joint interest in secure oil drilling), our EU partners (secure supply of oil and gas to Europe), the U.S. (American investments in exploration) and even the Russians, with the latter looking to grab a share of potential Cyprus energy deals for their own giants. However, this does not mean that any minor incident off our coast will be defended by U.S. Navy carriers, or RAF fighter jets or even by the French, German and Russian military.
The best way to avoid any stand-off with Turkey is to convince Israel, our EU partners and Washington that Cyprus can be trusted and it will not indulge in any further support of Syria’s Assad and other soon-to-be extinct popular dictators. Only if we show true solidarity can we earn solidarity, as a result of which envoys would be willing to tell Erdogan to comply with the Ankara protocol and allow Cyprus-flag ships to enter its ports and aircraft to cross its airspace. Only then would Turkey be told to behave and give up on its threatening antics.
But can Cyprus be trusted to get serious?
