TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/083192/0831unk.000

Text File | 1993-04-08 | 5.0 KB | 109 lines

                                                                                AMERICA ABROAD, Page 51

And Now For Some Good News


By Strobe Talbott


    In a world where countries seem to be breaking down and
falling apart, there is one that may actually be coming back
together. It is Cyprus, whose very name has for more than 30
years been a synonym for tribal hatred, religious strife and
diplomatic failure. Intensive negotiations at the United Nations
this fall may finally yield a breakthrough.

    Cyprus is a single island with two communities one Greek,
Christian and fairly prosperous; the other Turkish, Muslim and
relatively poor. The Greeks outnumber the Turks 4 to 1, and long
before the island won its independence from Britain in 1960,
many Greek Cypriots wanted enosis, or union with Greece. Given
that alternative, Turkish Cypriots not unreasonably preferred
partition and, in due course, the creation of their own state.
After much provocation, Turkey invaded in 1974 and seized the
northern third of Cyprus. The Greek community ended up with
160,000 refugees. Turkish Cypriots fared even worse. No country
but Turkey itself would grant them diplomatic recognition, and
their crippled economy became a drain on Ankara's resources.

    Over the decades, a parade of big-name U.S. peacemakers
came and went. George Ball, Dean Acheson, Cyrus Vance and Clark
Clifford all broke their picks on the problem.

    Now, quite suddenly, in talks due to resume in October,
the U.N. may be able to sponsor the creation of a "bizonal and
bicommunal federal state": each of the two communities would
have its own territory but share a number of ministries and
government functions. Bulent Aliriza, a once -- and perhaps
future -- Turkish Cypriot diplomat, who is currently a senior
associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace,
sees the makings of "the first settlement of an ethnic conflict
in the new world order."

    Cyprus is perhaps the best example of what might be called
the John Donne principle of world affairs: no country is an
island, entire of itself; every country is a piece of the
continent, a part of the main. The "inter communal" enmity
between Greek and Turkish Cypriots has always been an extension
of the regional feud between Greece and Turkey proper.

    Even though Greece and Turkey are both members of NATO,
they have bickered constantly over airspace, territorial waters
and the continental shelf, sometimes coming to the brink of
war. Both long ago became adept at playing Moscow and
Washington against each other: the Kremlin used the Cyprus
imbroglio to try to weaken the Western alliance and to make all
kinds of mischief in the eastern Mediterranean, from conducting
espionage to sponsoring terrorism.

    Now Russia is cooperating with the U.S. and Britain in the
U.N. Security Council, enabling Secretary-General Boutros
Boutros-Ghali to exert more influence than any of his
predecessors on the contending parties in the Cyprus dispute.

    These days Greece is eager to bury the hatchet with
Turkey. That is largely because of all the trouble in the
Balkans, where Greece has political interests and ethnic
kinsmen. Noting that "clouds are massing on our northern
borders," Prime Minister Constantine Mitsotakis has proclaimed
that "we do not face a threat from the East." He has vowed to
pursue "rapprochement" with Ankara. And for the first time the
Greek Cypriots have in George Vassiliou a President who has
truly repudiated enosis and is prepared to accept a federation
that will preserve the identity, guard the rights and foster the
economic development of the Turkish community.

    For Turkey too, new priorities have inspired new
flexibility. What used to be the Soviet republics of the
Caucasus and Central Asia are populated largely by
Turkic-speaking peoples, many of whom are looking to Ankara for
help. Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel sees an opportunity to
make Turkey a major regional power "from the Adriatic to the
Great Wall of China," and that makes him eager to settle
quarrels with his western neighbor. Demirel is nudging the
Turkish Cypriots to give up about a quarter of the territory
they have occupied since 1974 in exchange for an end to their
isolation both on the island and in the world.

    In the past, U.S. domestic politics have been a
complicating factor. There are more than 20 times as many Greek
Americans as Turkish Americans, and earlier governments in
Greece and Cyprus have mobilized the powerful Greek lobby in
Washington, tilting U.S. policy toward Athens and Nicosia.

    Mitsotakis and Vassiliou have broken with that pattern,
encouraging the Bush Administration to play honest broker. Says
Nelson Ledsky, the career diplomat who has served as the
Administration's special envoy for Cyprus: "This problem has
often been termed insoluble. I don't believe that. I think it
will be solved." If it is, it will be not only a credit to him
and the other mediators but also a bonus from the end of the
cold war.