Turkey’s foreign minister Abdullah Gul has announced that Turkey will publish a “detailed statement” on its policy towards Cyprus today, Tuesday.
Speculation is rife that it will include proposals for a deal that will combine implementation of the Ankara Protocol, which extends the customs union to all new member states including Cyprus, with the lifting of EI trade restrictions on northern Cyprus.
Turkey was obliged to sign the protocol before the EU agreed to open accession negotiations last October. However, it has been dragging its feet over implementation, hoping to tie it with a deal on Turkish Cypriot trade.
Greek Cypriots have blocked an EU plan to allow direct exports of Turkish Cypriot goods to the EU and to provide financial aid.
Currently all exports from the non-recognised Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus have to go via Turkey first and all aeroplanes on their way to Ercan/Tymbou airport in northern Cyprus have to land in Turkey first.
The absence of the protocol may be connected with a decline in the Cyprus shipping fleet.
Turkey may also present plans to return to ghost town of Varosha to Greek Cypriot control. The likelihood of a return of Varosha has increased since the European Court of Human Rights recently ruled on a case that involved Greek Cypriot property in the fenced off Varosha area.
The timing of Turkey’s move appears to be designed to catch Cyprus President Tassos Papadopoulos on the back foot and to make the most of a row between the Republic of Cyprus and Britain. The announcement would coincide with the arrival in Cyprus today of Britain’s Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, whom Cyprus President Tassos Papadopoulos has refused to meet, owing to a row about where Straw plans to meet the Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat.
The hope-for meetings with both Papadopoulos and Talat were meant to mark the start of new efforts to revive negotiations on a solution to the divided island, after a previous plan was rejected by a large majority of Greek Cypriots in a referendum in 2004.
Papadopoulos has insisted that any new negotiations be well prepared and have no fixed timetable.
Some now fear that Turkey will opt for the “Israeli policy” of imposing a solution on Greek Cypriots under its own terms.
