Cyprus will not abandon its gas exploration operations in the Mediterranean and will continue its drilling activities, in spite of attempts by Turkey to force it to stop, Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades has said.
Cyprus talks in Berlin
(From left to right) President of Cyprus Nicos Anastasiades, UN Secretary General António Guterres and President of Northern Cyprus Mustafa Akıncı shake hands following informal talks in Berlin last November. Photo: United Nations
The president of the Greek Cypriot republic said that he was willing to engage with Turkey on the issue of the reunification of the island, but that it would be an impossible goal if Ankara did not give up its insistence on an end to drilling.
“Disputing sovereign rights or setting preconditions such as ‘I’m violating international law and, in return, you must give up your sovereign rights so that we can talk’ … that doesn’t demonstrate either goodwill or good faith,” said Anastasiades, whose government is not officially recognised by Turkey.
“Just because Turkey doesn’t recognise us as a state, we should not renounce our statehood so that there’s dialogue,” Anastasiades added.
Turkish drillships, guarded by warships, are drilling within the Cypriot Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), making it more difficult for Ankara to back down in the dispute.
Last week, US Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources Francis Fannon called on both sides to avoid "provocative actions" that would undermine regional security.
He also gave his backing to Cyprus for the extraction of gas within its waters and made the suggestion that profits from the venture could be divided among the two communities on the divided island under a new peace deal.
Cyprus is in need of an additional source of income, as well as natural gas, but the issue of drilling has been the source of long-running disputes between the two communities.
Turkey first made the threat that it would start drilling in the EEZ back in 2011 after Cyprus issued a licence to Texas-based Noble Energy to drill for gas off its southern coast.
There are also increasing tensions between the Turkish Cypriot enclave and the nationalist government in Ankara ahead of an April election in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.
In an interview with The Guardian last week, the President of Turkish Cyprus Mustafa Akinci said that the window for reunification of the island was closing before the Turkish part of the island became another province of Turkey.
Commentators on the Turkish mainland have denounced Akinci's remarks as disloyal. The leftwing former mayor of Nicosia said that there were growing differences between the island's two communities.
Akinci, who launched his re-election campaign last week, said: “We need to hurry up. After all these years we have come to a crossroads, a decisive moment.”
The two Cypriot presidents met last week in the UN-controlled buffer zone in the capital, Nicosia.
Omer Celik, a spokesman for the Justice and Development (AK) Party of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said Akinci should apologise for his disrespectful remarks.
“We condemn those statements that defame our history’s national achievements and esteemed characters,” said Celik.
The most-recent reunification talks in 2017 in Switzerland failed to make any progress.
Turkish Cypriots want considerable devolution in a unified island and for some of the 35,000 Turkish troops currently stationed in the north to remain. The Greek Cypriot side has insisted that they leave.
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