Freedom and Fairness for Northern Cyprus (FFNC) welcomes the visit of UN Secretary-General António Guterres to Cyprus – the first by a sitting Secretary-General in over sixteen years, and the first since Ban Ki-moon in 2010.
A visit of this significance is itself a signal that the Cyprus issue has returned to the international agenda after years of stalemate. We welcome any form of constructive dialogue aimed at a just, fair and lasting outcome, and we commend the Secretary-General for the personal engagement he has shown in the final months of his tenure. That he has chosen to come to the island in person, meeting both President Tufan Erhürman and the Greek Cypriot leadership, reflects a seriousness of purpose that the people of this island have too rarely seen from the international community.
Any lasting settlement must begin from a simple truth: the Turkish Cypriots are equals on this island. This is not a matter of aspiration but of history and law.
When the Republic of Cyprus was established in 1960, it was founded as a partnership between two peoples. The Turkish Cypriots were co-founders and equal partners in that Republic, with their status enshrined in its constitution. In 1963, they were forcibly removed from the institutions of the state they had helped to create, driven from government, and left without the protections that partnership was meant to guarantee. They have lived under embargoes and isolation ever since.
Any process that does not recognise the political equality of the Turkish Cypriot people – their right to be heard, to participate, and to shape their own future – will not produce a durable peace. It will simply repeat the failures of the past.
We also urge realism about how the island reached this point. Too often, the history of Cyprus is told as though responsibility for the absence of a settlement is shared equally. The record shows otherwise.
In 2004, the United Nations put the Annan Plan to simultaneous referendums on both sides of the island. The Turkish Cypriots voted to accept it by 65%. The Greek Cypriots rejected it by 76%. Days later, the Greek Cypriot side was admitted to the European Union as the government of the whole island, while the Turkish Cypriots – who had voted for reunification – were left isolated.
In 2017, at the talks in Crans-Montana, it was again the Greek Cypriot side that walked away as a settlement came within reach. Time and again, over decades, the Turkish Cypriots have come to the table in good faith. Time and again, agreement has faltered on the other side of it.
We say this not to assign blame for its own sake, but because an honest account of the past is the only sound foundation for the future. A process built on a false equivalence of responsibility is unlikely to succeed.
We hope these talks succeed, and we support every genuine effort to reach a comprehensive settlement.
But if no agreement is reached, there can be no justification for prolonging the isolation of the Turkish Cypriot people any further. For over half a century, an entire population has been cut off from the world – denied direct flights, direct trade, and the ordinary connections that every other people takes for granted – through no fault of their own, and for a division they did not create.
This isolation is not an unavoidable fact of the dispute. It is a choice, and it was one the international community itself pledged to end. In April 2004, following the referendum, the European Union, the United Nations and others gave their word that the isolation of the Turkish Cypriots would be brought to an end. Twenty-two years later, that promise remains unkept. The Direct Trade Regulation that would have delivered it has never been implemented.
That promise must finally be honoured – whether or not a wider settlement is reached. Ending the isolation requires the recognition of no new state and prejudges the outcome of no negotiation. It is simply a matter of fairness, and of keeping a word that was freely given to a people who chose peace.
Peace on this island has held for over fifty years. What is still missing is fairness.
