HURRIYET- Columnist Oktay Eksi writes about the recent UN peace proposal for Cyprus and Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus President (TRNC) Rauf Denktas’s stance on the plan. A summary of his column is as follows:
At long last, Ankara has finally made up its mind on UN’s revised Cyprus proposal. We learned of this yesterday when TRNC President Rauf Denktas announced that he and the Turkish government stood together on the issue. Following Wednesday’s foreign policy summit in Ankara, Denktas said that the new government had experienced some hesitation before it could fully grasp the problem. ‘But I now see that we’re in full agreement on the issue,’ he declared.
This is Denktas’s fate: He always faces hard times and sometimes is even left alone to defend his cause. Yet his goals are well defined, and he knows how to get there. He never gives up before finally reaching his destination. Once again he has been forced to struggle alone, even while fighting heart problems, against UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s solution proposal, a plan which we had previously thought was very close to the Turkish side’s interests. Yet we had a change of heart when we came to see how the proposal uses underhanded tactics to try to snatch away the Turkish side’s sovereignty rights. Turkish Foreign Minister Yasar Yakis himself flew to New York earlier this month to convince Denktas not to reject the UN plan, but returned home convinced by Denktas that the plan needed to be examined more carefully. Surprisingly enough, Yakis said that the international community could declare the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) present on the island as an ‘occupying force’ if a settlement for Cyprus isn’t reached before next Feb. 28, the deadline the UN has set. Nevertheless, Denktas has finally managed to bring Ankara around to his line of reasoning.
Entering the EU is now everyone’s dream. Many people in both Turkey and the TRNC accuse Denktas of blocking this dream. They say that once integration with the Union is achieved, the problem of sovereignty will pale in importance. Every member will be dependent on each other on equal terms. But if that’s the case, why do you think that Greek Cyprus and Great Britain refuse to give any ground on the sovereignty issue? Why do they not give any concessions but on the contrary Turkey is expected to do?
Those who put the blame on Denktas should ask themselves this question: What if Denktas had not resisted, how could they have led their lives under a Greek Cypriot administration?
SOURCE: OFFICE OF THE PRIME MINISTER, DIRECTORATE GENERAL OF PRESS AND INFORMATION