Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0103/01032.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 40KB | 653 lines

$Unique_ID{COW01032}
$Pretitle{222}
$Title{Cyprus
Chapter 4A.   Government and Politics}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Margarita Dobert}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{turkish
cypriot
greek
president
cypriots
government
constitution
community
cyprus
court}
$Date{1979}
$Log{George Vassiliou*0103202.scf
}
Country:     Cyprus
Book:        Cyprus, A Country Study
Author:      Margarita Dobert
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1979

Chapter 4A.   Government and Politics

[See George Vassiliou: President of Cyprus. Courtesy Embassy of Cyprus,
Washington DC]

     The Turkish intervention of mid-1974 decisively changed the internal
balance of power on the island and the nature of the political administration
under which one-fourth of the population lived. The constitutional and
governmental arrangements formulated in the Zurich-London agreements of
February 1959 gave sovereignty over all but 256 square kilometers of the
island to the Republic of Cyprus, the excepted areas reserved by Britain for
use as military bases. Since the intervention, however, the island has been
divided for all practical purposes into two mutually exclusive political
entities. The partition has been upheld by Turkish military forces stationed
in the northern, Turkish Cypriot administered area that calls itself the
Turkish Federated State of Cyprus and is in effect autonomous. Nevertheless
the government of the Republic of Cyprus, composed entirely of Greek Cypriots,
claims authority over the entire island.

     The origins of the de-facto division could be traced to developments
preceding partition by more than a decade, when fierce fighting had broken out
between the two communities, in the midst of which Turkish Cypriots ceased
participating in the national government. During and after the worst of the
fighting, the Turkish minority withdrew into segregated enclaves scattered
around the island, within which an ostensibly provisional administration was
established. After the intervention, that body served as the nucleus of an
autonomous Turkish Cypriot administration in the north.

     On February 13, 1975, a little more than a week after the imposition by
the United States of an arms embargo against Turkey, the Turkish Cypriot
leader, Rauf Denktas, proclaimed the existence of the "Turkish Federated State
of Cyprus." The self-proclaimed new state, he asserted, was "not a unilateral
declaration of independence" but a first step toward federation with the Greek
Cypriot community. Vedat Celik, the Turkish Cypriot representative to the
United Nations (UN), stated before the Security Council that the new regime
would not seek international recognition as an independent state. The Turkish
government declared that the Turkish Cypriots had acted on their own and that
the new federated state would safeguard its security and its social and
economic life. Greece, however, reacted strongly, calling the action illegal
and a danger to peace in a delicate region, while in Nicosia, President
Archbishop Makarios III denounced it in equally strong terms.

     President Makarios had been the guiding hand of the republic for over a
decade. No other person approached him in influence among his Greek Cypriot
compatriots, commanding as he did both their religious and political
allegiance. On his death in the summer of 1977 from a heart attack at age
sixty-three, he left no clearly designated political heir, but political
leaders from left to right united in a show of Greek Cypriot solidarity to
back Spyros Kyprianou, leader of the ruling Democratic Front, as acting
president for the remainder of the presidential term. Makarios' ecclesiastical
functions were taken over by Bishop Chrysostomos of Paphos who was elected
archbishop three months later. Kyprianou was reelected unopposed on January
28, 1978, and announced his new cabinet a month later.

     In mid-1979 both Greek and Turkish Cypriots continued to proclaim their
desire for a peaceful settlement but on terms that were unacceptable to the
other side. The Greek Cypriots had come reluctantly to accept the concept of a
biregional federation, a permeable border, and limited regional autonomy but
insisted on a strong federal government. The Turkish Cypriots sought union of
two strong regional governments within a weak federation. Intercommunal talks
resumed in the spring of 1979 after a two-year lapse but by the end of June
had proved as inconclusive as earlier ones.

Government Structure

     The governmental system of the Republic of Cyprus in mid-1979 evolved
from constitutional and practical circumstances surrounding the attainment of
the island's independence from Britain and of internal self-government in
1960. Greek and Turkish Cypriots were joined in an independent state whose
Constitution and international status derived from agreements reached in
Zurich and London in February 1959 (see The Republic of Cyprus, ch. 1.). The
agreements, providing for a strongly bicommunal constitution and a jointly
guaranteed status of independence that prohibited enosis and partition, were a
compromise between conflicting Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot demands.

     The Constitution entered into effect on August 16, 1960, the day Cyprus
became independent. At no time was it ever submitted to popular referendum or
plebiscite by the electorate or to ratification by any directly or indirectly
elected representative legislature. It remained in force in the republic in
mid-1979, although several of its original provisions were modified by
unilateral Greek Cypriot action in January 1964 (see Constitutional Crisis:
1963, this ch.).

Bicommunal Aspects of the 1960 Constitution

     The strongly bicommunal Constitution, which called for a government
divided into executive, legislative, and judicial branches headed by a
president, contained elaborate safeguards for the minority Turkish Cypriot
community. The first provision stipulated that there be a Greek Cypriot
president and a Turkish Cypriot vice president, each elected by his own
community. For constitutional purposes, the Greek and Turkish communities were
defined, and members of the country's few other small minorities were given
the option of joining one or the other. Armenian, Maronite, and Roman Catholic
Cypriots-the latter known in Cyprus as Latins-chose soon after the
promulgation of the Constitution to be identified as Greek. Greek and Turkish
were designated as official languages, and the Greek and Turkish communities
were given the right to celebrate respectively Greek and Turkish national
holidays.

     The Constitution further provided that executive power over all except
communal affairs be vested in the Greek Cypriot president and the Turkish
Cypriot vice president as head and vice head of state respectively, to be
elected to five-year terms of office. The two executives had the right of
veto, separately or conjointly, over certain laws or decisions of both the
Council of Ministers and the Legislative Assembly. The Constitution spelled
out in detail their powers and duties.

     The Constitution further provided that the president and vice president
be assisted by the Council of Ministers composed of seven Greek and three
Turkish members, the former appointed by the president and the latter by the
vice president. Decisions of the council were to be taken by an absolute
majority. Of three key portfolios-defense, finance, and foreign affairs-one
was to be held by a Turkish Cypriot.

     The unicameral House of Representatives was designed to legislate for
the republic in all matters except those expressly reserved to separate
Communal Chambers. The Constitution provided that thirty-five of its members
be Greek Cypriots and fifteen Turkish Cypriots, a ratio much out of
proportion to communal strength according to which Greek Cypriots
outnumbered their Turkish counterparts by four to one. Members, elected from
separate communal rolls, were to serve for terms of five years. The president
of the House of Repres