This thesis will be providing an original observation in an unoriginal way; it will be discussing how the uncontextualised interpretation of legal matters pertaining to the Cyprus problem have deepened the division on the island and thus rendered partition a new solution. The argument is that the EU’s strategy has simply de-humanised the wider Cypriot public as it is dealing with the Cyprus problem in a vacuum.
New elements are constantly being added to the already enigmatic Cyprus problem.
Since I am of Turkish Cypriot origin, the Cyprus problem is close to my heart and I simply wanted to provide an alternative perspective to the legal and political arguments that already exist on this topic.It goes without saying that this conflict has been attacked by many academics, lawyers and politicians over the years; even though the political and the legal do not exist in watertight compartments, for the purpose of addressing the Cyprus problem efficiently, the individual effects of these two disciplines need to be taken into consideration. Conflict resolution involves both
‘cognitive’ (the analysis of the conflict) and ‘behavioural’ (the practice of problem solving) factors.146 Thus, the EU needs to understand what the Cyprus problem is actually about, in its full contextual complexity, prior to choosing the appropriate behavioural response. The well-known social philosopher Stuart Hampshire has eloquently concluded that even though we will never really agree about what the content of widespread justice is ‘because there never will be such a harmony, either in the soul or in the city,’ we may be able to understand that ‘fairness in procedures for resolving conflicts is the fundamental kind of fairness, and that it is acknowledged as a value in most cultures, places, and times: fairness in procedure is an invariable value, a constant in human nature.’147
145 Albeit there is a nexus between the pre-accession policy adopted for the RoC and EU politics, the EU legal order did not play a polluted role during this process.
146 Carrie Menkel-Meadow, ‘From Legal Disputes to Conflict Resolution and Human Problem Solving: Legal Dispute Resolution in a Multidisciplinary Context’ (Georgetown University Law
Center, Scholarship @ Georgetown Law, 2004)
<http://scholarship.law.georgetown.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1587&context=facpub> accessed 11 July 2015.
147 Stuart Hampshire, Justice is Conflict (Princeton 2000) 4.
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The methodology used addresses the legal complexities of a conflict that has been highly judicialised without being blind to its political nature. A legally ‘autistic’
contribution on the link between the EU legal order and the Cyprus problem would have been pointless since the legal issues have come about as a result of the historical and political aspects of this conflict. Therefore, in every chapter, this research tries to put the relevant legal issues concerning the Cyprus anomaly and the partial application of the acquis into its political and historical context and prove that the legislative devices of the EU have not been altered by the persevering realities of the Cyprus problem.Thus, the thesis consists of a critique of the EU approach on sensitive issues arising from the conflict, such as the political and economic isolation of the Turkish Cypriot EU citizens and the positions of the conflicting parties in relation to the future settlement of the problem.The research therefore portrays an overall picture of the partial application of the EU law north of the ‘Green Line’ and the compatibility of a possible future settlement plan which takes into consideration the democratic right of self-determination of the Turkish Cypriot community with the EU legal order. The only way left for the EU to help resolve the Cyprus problem is to aim to broker a deal between the two Cypriot communities which will permit the recognition of the TRNC or at least the ‘Taiwanisation’ of northern Cyprus.
The thesis will be illuminating a theoretical approach which both conceptually and functionally provides a more coherent means of explaining why the EU is failing as a conflict mediator in Cyprus. Although Europeanisation scholars have touched upon matters close to the Cyprus conflict148 or the relevance of the EU to the RoC which represents the government that has monopolised EU accession149 and from which the entity attempts secession, their overt domestic scene and how it is impacted by the EU remains under-researched. Europeanisation scholars do not tend to focus on countries or communities with limited external projection.This is a gap that this thesis addresses.Despite the Europeanisation of the Turkish Cypriot community, they are habitually disregarded because of the EU’s interpretation of its current legal framework. Since the self-declared TRNC is not recognised and EU law is suspended in northern Cyprus, the Turkish-Cypriots represent an idiomatic partner of Brussels but the relations between the two resemble the experience of EU
148 See Coppieters et al (n 78); Diez (n 125) and Tocci (n 72).
149 See Kevin Featherstone, ‘Cyprus and the Onset of Europeanization: Strategic Usage, Structural Transformation and Institutional Adaptation’ (2000) 5(2) South European Society and Politics 141.
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enlargement: the EU’s relevance to the community has been based on the prospects for EU accession (via reunification) and assistance towards preparation for potential EU integration through financial and technical aid.
It is necessary to not only evaluate the decisions taken by the EU institutions vis-à-vis Cyprus, but to also analyse the reasons behind the adoption of such decisions. In order to do so, primary source material has been relied on derived directly from the EU’s official documents; verbatim records, judgments, Advocate General (AG) opinions, regulations, official speeches, implementation reports, Member State comments and other official records directly attributable to the EU and its institutions are invaluable to the research as they offer the most accurate accounts of proceedings and developments.150 With the aim of understanding the epistemology surrounding the research area, secondary resources were used to develop the conceptual and theoretical framework of this thesis. Moreover, competing theories from academic literature on the Cyprus problem and the EU were analysed in order to gain a greater understanding of the problems that exist in the EU’s approach towards the Turkish Cypriot community. This research examines, from a legal and political point of view, issues that have surfaced since the publication of the great works of Tocci,151 Diez,152 Ker-Lindsay153 and Skoutaris.154
Content analysis is a systematic way of classifying information; it helps generate descriptive data based on the ideological framework of the information in a semiological fashion.155 This research would not vastly benefit from interviews, questionnaires and other quantitative research methods; the goal of this thesis is not to statistically measure views or quantify results but rather to use the selection of events to gain an understanding of the underlying process of decision making in the EU vis-à-vis Cyprus. Nonetheless, this does not mean that it will not be incorporating the
150 The primary data for the research also consists of written EU and UN documentation, such as Protocol 10, cases and letters from the presidents of the RoC and TRNC addressed to the UN dating back to 1974.
151 Tocci (n 72).
152 Thomas Diez (ed), The European Union and the Cyprus Conflict: Modern Conflict, Postmodern Union (Manchester University Press 2002).
153 James Ker-Lindsay, EU Accession and UN Peacemaking in Cyprus (Palgrave Macmillan 2005).
154 Nikos Skoutaris, The Cyprus Issue: The Four Freedoms in a Member State under Siege (Hart Publishing 2011).
155 Limor Peer and Mary Nesbitt, ‘Content Analysis Methodology’ (Readership Institute, July 2004)
<http://www.readership.org/new_readers/data/content_analysis_methodology.pdf> accessed 14 December 2014.
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valuable information acquired from conferences and informal discussions that have been conducted with Turkish Cypriot government officials.156Although the research would have been fortified if information was also collected from the Greek Cypriot officials, as mentioned earlier, the focus of this project is predominantly on the under-researched effects of the EU on the Turkish Cypriot community and the TRNC.
I am aware that my methodological approach has led me to a biased standpoint, but, there is no universal truth in the Cyprus conflict. Everything we hear or read is an opinion, not a fact; everything we see is a perspective, not the truth. We all prize the truth, but all truth is personal, comparative and relative.
I had two principal goals whilst undertaking this research. Primarily, I wanted to describe the special status quo of northern Cyprus within the EU legal order.Even though there are other territorial/geographical exceptions to the application of EU law, northern Cyprus is a distinctive case. The working hypothesis for this part of the research has been that, however objectionable it is for the political life of the Union, the EU legal order has the capacity to accommodate the status quo in Cyprus if the law is contextualised. Unfortunately, the Court of Justice tends to react negatively to such an approach and insists on maintaining the proper functioning of the EU regime. The EU simply needs to adopt more measures to ensure that the Turkish Cypriot community is genuinely part of the EU family or accept the fact that the RoC can no longer represent the entire island in the EU. This research contributes to the discussion on the role of the EU in contested States.In sum, it aspires to a comparative relevance: the Turkish Cypriot case becomes a blueprint for the examination of the Europeanisation of other contested States.
The second aim of this research has been to highlight the fact that the Union membership of the RoC has proven that the well-known parameters of a future settlement plan, based on the principles of bi-zonality, bi-communality and political equality of the two Cypriot communities, are insufficient. The working hypothesis for this section of the research has been that since the EU is capable of accommodating the status quo, it would be ridiculous to prevent the right of
156 A face to face interview brings with it flexibility, and it will accord with the interviewee’s own perspective rather than my own. Unfortunately, unstructured interviews suffer from categorisation;
they require the imposition of second-order constructs.
See Steinar Kvale, Interviews: An Introduction to Qualitative Research Interviewing (Sage Publications 1996) 13.
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determination/secession of the Turkish Cypriot community. The EU has stipulated in the 5th Recital of Protocol No 10 on Cyprus that it is prepared to accommodate the terms of a settlement so long as they are in line with the founding principles of the Union; hence, even if there will be problems between the chosen solution and the EU legal system, the EU is willing to accept the derogations from the acquis that such a solution could demand. The accommodation of a solution that would require derogations from EU law is compatible with Protocol No 10 and with the fact that according to Article 6 TEU, the EU is founded on the ‘principles of liberty, democracy, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, and the rule of law’.
The Member States are the ‘Masters of the Treaties’ and therefore they can find tailor-made solutions which will accommodate an international political dispute that has countless consequences within the EU legal order. Nevertheless, the EU’s flexibility in cases as such does not mean that it will always allow States with border or political conflicts to simply join the family without resolving their domestic issues first. The case of Cyprus has taught the EU a serious lesson; although the current legal regime of the Union is somewhat coping with the case of Cyprus, the only way for it to stop dehumanising the Turkish Cypriots and to provide for a solution to all the pending issues of the Gordian knot is if the Cyprus problem is resolved via democratic means. This research has simply reconfirmed that the EU can build a bridge over troubled waters, so long as it adopts a ‘law in context’ approach and enacts policies that give those with a limited external projection a voice; yet, the EU cannot resolve all problems. Even though the Union can offer its Member States political stability, the solution of international political problems needs the willingness and commitment of the predominant actors involved.
Whether or not it is possible for the TRNC to be internationally recognised is not within the ambit of this research as this issue is extremely complex and involves deep-rooted politics between Russia and Turkey. By all means, this thesis does not intend to ‘resolve’ the Cyprus problem, nor will it explore the island’s turbulent history in thorough detail; it merely highlights the wrongdoings of the EU and suggests alternative political and legal routes for it to take on this bumpy journey.
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