The long-festering dispute on the eastern Mediterranean island has poisoned relations between Greece and Turkey, both NATO members, undermining the alliance and European Union cooperation on security while hindering Turkey's bid for EU membership.
“It's a matter that either we solve it to unite us, or it will keep us divided,” Papandreou, who is also handling his government's foreign affairs, said on Monday after talks with Greek Cypriot leader Dimitris Christofias. “Certainly, occupation troops cannot be allowed to exist in an EU-member state, especially by an EU-candidate country,” said Papandreou, who is paying his first official visit abroad as prime minister after winning general elections earlier this month. Also earlier this month, days after being elected, Papandreou paid his first foreign trip to Turkey by attending an informal meeting of the Southeast European Cooperation Process (SEECP), which was hosted by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu.
Year-long talks between Christofias and Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat have so far produced little real progress. Christofias faults Turkey for restricting Talat's ability to negotiate an agreement on complex issues such as power-sharing under a federal structure and arrangements on property lost during the war. Turkey says it fully backs the peace process. Christofias renewed his support for Turkey's bid to join the EU. But he added: “We're not masochists. … We can't accept Turkey proceeding to full union membership without first achieving a Cyprus settlement.”
Turkey sent its troops to Cyprus in 1974 following a decade of attacks on Turkish Cypriots by Greek Cypriot groups favoring unification with Greece and eventually a Greek-inspired coup on the island. Turkey now has more than 30,000 troops deployed on the Turkish part of the island.
Cyprus joined the EU as a divided island when Greek Cypriots in the south rejected a UN reunification plan in twin referendums in 2004, even though the Turkish Cypriots in the north overwhelmingly supported it. The issue of security guarantees is one of the thorniest disputes that Talat and Christofias need to tackle during the negotiations.
