A taboo-busting Cyprus problem scenario for the new world disorder
One bad scenario, one middling one, and a taboo-buster with potential
Image source: Shutterstock.
Something fundamental has changed in the world ‘rules-based order’ which, from the end of the Second World War in 1945 to around the turn of this century, created at least some measure of certainty about how big countries would or could behave, at least towards other big powers or other western countries.
I accept that some will note that the big powers had always embroiled themselves in proxy wars—the US and China in Vietnam; the US and the Soviet Union in Angola, to name just two. So if you lived in any of those proxy war countries, life was anything but orderly. In more recent times, the US, Russia, Iran, Turkey and others I have probably missed were also all involved in Syria.
There is also a raging debate about whether the US president, Donald Trump, broke the law when he ordered cluster bombs to be dropped on Iran without having been directly attacked and without approval from elected representatives of the US Congress.
And there is plenty of discussion about whether or not the attack was justified on military grounds and whether or not it actually achieved the aim of preventing Iran from producing a bomb (one early intelligence assessment said it only put the nuclear bomb project back by a few months).
The old way won’t come back
Whatever your opinions on those, it still feels as though something big has changed. The country that remains the world’s biggest power and which for decades had been seen as the world’s ‘policeman’ has sent a message that it is all right to go attack another country when it had not attacked yours.
This follows the message that it is all right to demand from your allies—Denmark and Canada—that they hand over their sovereignty and be absorbed into your country, plus all the other wanderings from normal government behaviour that are too countless to name.
Arguably all of these things were only the acceleration of a trend that has been going on for a while, perhaps as far back as 1999 with the bombing of Kosovo without UN Security Council approval under a former US president, Bill Clinton. If this is indeed just the last phase of a long-term trend, we should assume that things are not going back to the way they were. (James Ker-Lindsay also makes that point in a YouTube video here and was in fact what prompted me to write this article.)
So what does this all mean for ye old cyprobbe? I think there are three scenarios, one bad, one middling and one with at least some potential to lead us somewhere good, if only we—the international community as well as the politicians—have the courage to take it. Let’s start with the worst-case scenario.
Worst-case scenario: Turkey takes all Cyprus in 20-30 years
In 20 or 30 years’ time, with no ‘world policeman’ around, the Cyprus problem still unresolved and people of Turkish Cypriot origin having more or less disappeared from northern Cyprus, Türkiye (Turkey) decides it is time to take the whole island. Maybe the seeds start two decades earlier, with Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, fearing that he or his party might lose the presidential election due in 2028 and deciding that a crisis in Cyprus would be good for electoral prospects.
Would he immediately take the whole island in 2028? Not yet. But, totally speculating, he might decide to take a chunk of the buffer zone. Will the UN’s dwindling unarmed forces be able to stop it? No. Will the EU be able to stop it? No; it could not stop Russia in Ukraine. Will the US do anything about it in this new world disorder? Maybe not. Mr Erdogan and Mr Trump seem to be a path of friendship these days, with reports that Mr Trump answers Mr Erdogan’s phone calls within 24 hours.
Lots of other things would also have to go wrong for this to happen, in particular a deterioration of currently okayish relations with the EU and Greece. Cyprus therefore depends more than is comfortable on Greece and the EU for its stability.
Middling scenario: Cyprus remains energy-isolated with no gas exports either
A middling scenario is that Turkey takes its cue from the new world disorder to continue creating trouble for the Great Sea Interconnector—the submarine electricity cable that is due to link the Greek island of Crete with Cyprus and eventually Israel. It would finally link us to the rest of the European grid, end energy isolation and should allow for energy exports from this sunny isle. But the cable is already said to be a year behind schedule because of Turkey’s objections.
Turkey could potentially also be emboldened to prevent any natural gas exports from Cyprus. Fourteen years after its first natural gas discovery, Cyprus has yet to export any gas.
I actually wonder whether that Turkey is already preventing the current best hope for exports. Remember when ENI was going to be “fast-tracking” its exports from the 2.5 trillion cubic feet (tcf) Cronos field in Block 6? When we were supposed to have a development plan from ENI that would lead to a final investment decision (FID) by the end of the year? What happened to that? It has all gone rather quiet.
The problem with the middling scenario is that it still has the risk of deteriorating into the worst-case scenario. Is there another way of preventing that from happening?
A taboo-busting scenario with potential
One feature of the new world disorder is that it breaks taboos. Things are said which were never allowed to be said before.
Perhaps in this new world disorder, everyone can break taboos and admit the following.
1. Forget a big bang solution. There is no way on earth that Greek Cypriots will ever vote for a “big bang” solution that has them running two-thirds of the island on the day of the referendum and sharing power for the whole of the island the day after. Yes I know it is they who insist on that kind of solution “ to preserve the Republic”. But the big bang approach will always inevitably fail.
2. Accept step-by-step. Given the above, we must all accept that a step-by-step process is the only path to a power-sharing settlement.
3. Embrace citizen deliberation. Given the Republic of Cyprus’ resistance to a step-by-step process, the only way to get political buy-in for it is through a modern democratic and deliberative process of involving citizens. It must be professionally and independently managed by people who have done it many times before in conflicted places. Yes I am talking about a citizens’ assembly, involving a randomly selected cross-section of society being compensated for spending weeks learning about, and deliberating on, difficult issues.
4. Accept we are already a NATO base. There is no way on earth that Turkey will ever withdraw all of its military forces. Quite the opposite: it wants a permanent presence here, like it does in all of its near-abroad and will want it all the more so given the new world disorder. The best we can hope for is the Turkish military as part of a bigger group of countries, eg NATO. We already have the UK and are about to have the US. The solution to “troops” is staring us in the face.
5. Build in back-stops. What if, half way through the step-by-step process, citizens on both sides decide they do not want to integrate any further? This is where we need backstops, devised during the deliberative process, so that everyone knows what the end-game looks like, even if we do not reach a fully united, power-sharing Cyprus. These backstops need to be attractive to both sides, in order to get them to agree to a step-by-step process in the first place. There is already some thought going into what backstops might look like so I won’t spoil it for those working on it.
6. The final taboo: accept citizens might choose partition. The final taboo for Greek Cypriots and the international community: accept that whether this island is united or divided in 50 years’ time should not be the choice of foreigners (including me) or of well educated elites, but it should be decided by citizens who are trusted enough to have a good long, and, critically, well informed think about where they want the island to be in 50 years’ time. Citizens have never been given that chance. Having seen the way Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots eventually interact when they start off wary of each other, I believe that they would not ultimately choose partition. But we cannot get to a step-by-step, power-sharing solution without accepting that this is one of the possible outcomes. Alas some people do not want deliberative democracy for the citizens, for fear that ‘hoi polloi’ will choose partition. But what is worse: maintaining hope in the neverland of the big bang solution and thereby increasing the risk of full annexation? Or putting our faith in citizens and throwing our best efforts at the only process that might actually put this island back together again?
I really didn’t want to write anything this week. It’s hot and I am physically and mentally tired and have two big, concurrent deadlines for paid work. More than once I thought of sending an announcement that I am dropping this newsletter completely and offering to reimburse the grand total of two people who are paying the voluntary EUR 49 per year. I guess this is a long way of saying, if you can manage it and find value in this newsletter, there is a way to help my motivation.
Find out more about Fiona Mullen here and about the range of Sapienta Cyprus analysis products and services here.