Fools Rush Into Turkey So this Coalition government wants to see Turkey inside the EU. David Cameron’s visit to Ankara this week leaves no doubt. He apparently thinks that giving the right to live and work in the UK to another 80 million Muslims is sensible. Well I do not. Nor, I suspect, do millions of others in the UK , let alone all over continental Europe . My former MEP colleague in the European Parliament’s non-attached group, Daniel Hannan, writes this morning inThe Daily Telegraph that Cameron is right because “Turkey guarded Europe’s flank against the Bolshevists for three generations, and may one day be called on to do the same against the jahadis”. I am reluctant to disagree with a man whose intelligence and principled politics I greatly respect. But on this occasion I believe he is profoundly wrong. And so is Cameron. The argument Hannan advanced does not stand up. Turkey is far from being a solid western-style liberal democracy. The present Turkish government is hanging on by its fingernails. Fundamentalist Islamists are trying – right now – to overthrow it and return Turkey to its medieval past and sharia law. They are doing worrying well. History suggests they may well win in the end. How do I know? But Turkey cannot begin to contemplate paying the market value for the land it seized in 1975, let alone today’s value and the value of any improvements. Such a settlement is unthinkable to the Turks. On the other hand, the Cyprus government will never agree to anything less than full restitution of the land seized, or full compensation. This impasse has shown no signs of being overcome in decades. Meanwhile, the EU stands ineffectually by, waving its hands in the air and sending people like me to have a close and regular look on the ground. There is also much gnashing of teeth in a frustrated Brussels as the bureaucrats see no end to the embarrassing fact that part of the EU is unlawfully occupied by foreign troops, and they can do absolutely nothing about it. In any case, new membership of the EU is subject to a unanimous vote in support by the existing 27 member states. Cyprus therefore has a veto and will use it. 
28 July 2010
Wednesday, 28 July 2010
I spent three years on the European Parliament's committee trying to reconcile the conflict between Cyprus and Turkey over the status of northern Cyprus . I met and talked to all the key players on both sides on many occasions.
The Turks invaded Northern Cyprus in 1975 when they thought the then Cyprus government was
about to unite with Greece . As a result, millions of acres of Northern Cyprus, including the port of Kyrenia , were seized from their legitimate owners who have never received any compensation, even after 35 years.
Cyprus has a land registry based on British principles, so all the evidence is recorded as to whom owns which parcel of land. Much of it has since been built on by developers and sold to British and other holiday-makers wanting a cheap second home in the sun. Many buyers now know their property was
built on land the developer did not own. They also now know that the legitimate owner will seek restitution the moment any settlement is agreed between the lawful government in Nicosia and the Turkish government in Ankara . One international court case has already been settled in their favour.
Furthermore, and crucially, the Greek-dominated Cyprus government demands as part of any final settlement the restoration of a freely elected all-island government. Again, the Turks will never agree to the permanent second-class citizenship status that would entail.
To them, Cameron’s self-inspired intervention must have seemed like manna from heaven.
Mr Cameron needs to understand that the Turks will only ever join the EU on their own terms and that will include recognition of Northern Cyprus as Turkish. And the Greek-dominated Cyprus government in the south of the island will never agree.
France gave itself more than a veto on the issue of Turkish membership. President Chirac added to the French constitution a requirement that every new membership application to the EU shall be decided in France by a national referendum. Chirac knew the French would never vote for Turkish membership. They remember Algeria too well.
Cameron is either out of his mind, or the briefing before his visit was woeful. There is no other logical explanation.
I can only imagine the impact his words will have in Cyprus . The Cypriots will hate him for it. And they may well try to take revenge by pressuring the British garrison still stationed in Cyprus , ostensibly to keep the peace between the Turkish north and the Greek south.
Talk about fools rushing in...
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