It appears that after 18 months of talks between the presidents of Greek and Turkish Cyprus, the negotiations that are supposed to lead to the reunification of the island nation have once again broken down, with no resumption in sight.
Many Americans might simply think, so what? But the continued division of the island of 1.1 million people, the split dating from 1974, remains an expensive, open wound in the body of Europe.
The European Union, of which Greek Cyprus is a member, had a chance to solve the problem when Greek Cyprus applied for membership in the E.U. The E.U. could have said at that point, resolve the problem of the division of the island between Greeks and Turks, forming one Cyprus, and then we will admit Cyprus to the Union. Instead, the members succumbed to pressure from Greece and let Greek Cyprus in without reunification in 2004.
The result, made even more bitter by Greece’s own continuing financial problems, is that Greek Cyprus itself fell victim to incompetent, corrupt government and required a financial bailout of its own in 2013, amounting to $11 billion.
Now, President Nicos Anastasiades of Greek Cyprus and President Mustafa Akinci of Northern (Turkish) Cyprus have been negotiating in Geneva under the eye of the United Nations, which continues to spend money on Cyprus, standing between the two parties, for some 18 months now. They announced recently that they had reached a stalemate, with the Greeks making demands that the Turks considered unreasonable and the Turks making demands that the Greeks considered unacceptable.
The world may now have reached the point where it considers it desirable to just let the two parties stew in their own juice. The United Nations should spend no additional money trying to reconcile them or, on the island, standing between them. The cost of that last year was $55 million. The United States should take the position that it will no longer participate in the financing of any U.N. activities related to Cyprus until, first, negotiations have resumed, and, second, a sharp deadline is set for the two parties to work out an agreement.
There is no reason now for the United States or the United Nations to humor either the Greeks or the Turks in their ridiculous recalcitrance. That would be a reasonable position for the new administration of President-elect Donald Trump to take on this old, needless, expensive problem.
First Published December 31, 2016, 5:00 a.m.