They want it all before talks even start

Ahead of UN Secretary-General António Guterres’s visit to the island , the occupying side is setting conditions and prerequisites for breaking the deadlock and restarting talks. Of course, if their conditions were met and their demands satisfied, the Turkish side would have no reason left to cooperate. Because by then, it would already have everything it wanted. Nicosia has spent this whole period systematically and methodically pushing for developments so a new initiative can move forward and bear fruit. It’s already working. And what Nicosia is asking for is simply the obvious. Not conditions and prerequisites. Above all, not conditions designed to work against the other side. With the coming days in mind, the President of the Republic has drawn an “inviolable red line”: the continuation of the Republic of Cyprus. That means no discussion of a two-state solution, and no discussion of a disguised confederation. Speaking at a memorial event marking the anniversaries of the coup and the invasion, Nikos Christodoulides made clear he has no intention of becoming “the President of partition,” nor of signing any settlement that isn’t workable, viable and built to last. What the President said isn’t only about Greek Cypriots. It’s about Turkish Cypriots too, every citizen of this country. What the Turkish Cypriot side is demanding, by contrast, serves Ankara and its own strategic ambitions on the island and beyond. The Republic of Cyprus belongs to everyone. It is the state of all Cypriots, and everyone has a duty to defend it. At the same time, everyone must insist on safeguarding every one of its rights. As the President put it: “We are asking for the bare minimum, the obvious, the basic, the self-evident: that every single lawful citizen of the Republic of Cyprus, Greek Cypriots, Turkish Cypriots, Maronites, Armenians and Latins, should have the right to enjoy exactly what every other European citizen enjoys.” In a member state of the European Union , human rights should be guaranteed, never in doubt. Human rights and basic freedoms cannot be treated as anything other than a given. They cannot sit on the table for discussion, because they are non-negotiable. There are, of course, those who disagree with this framework. And they are the same people who work against these principles, permanently at odds with international normality.