Front Page Headlines
Take off of airfares, landing for trips
Trips to Greece have dropped due to the expensive airfare. Hoteliers turn to the locals to cover their reduced occupancy. The prices of hotels in the Cypriot resorts for July and August.
- Akinci: Contacts with US-UK
- Spat over the intention of the letter (by Anastasiades to Guterres)
They are leading the natural gas to the (negotiations) table
The Turkish side is blackmailing to have the energy issues included in the Cyprob talks. AKEL-government controversy over the president’s intentions.
- Exhumations start at Pachyammos for missing persons since the 1964 bombings
The president’s ‘brilliant’ ideas convince no one
President Anastasiades’ ‘new ideas’, which are outside the Guterres Framework cannot be a way out of the dead end. Questions arise about whom Anastasiades consulted in order to submit his brilliant ideas, with which convergences are turned down… Question marks also over the silence of the rest of the political powers.
‘Don’t defame our halloumi’
Cyprus defends against Swedish ’smear’, alludes to ‘trade war’.
Alexis (Tsipras) is going, Kyriacos (Mitsotakis) is coming
What did the final polls show a few days before the polling stations in Greece open. The prime minister does not seem to turn the game around, despite his constant interviews and announcements on benefits. The president of New Democracy (Mitsotakis) has called for self-reliance. Golden Dawn risks remaining outside parliament while the Movement for Change is being established in third place.
- Another window has closed for the sale of TC properties – Through the decision of the Supreme Court. The appeal by a TC woman with British Citizenship who has been living in Britain since 1959, and who tried to sell her property in Ayios Theodoros in Tylliria transferred to her by her father who has been living in the occupied areas since 1974, has been rejected.
- New dispute over the Cyprob – AKEL: The president’s positions are wrong. Presidential Palace: AKEL’s stance is harmful.
- They are slandering halloumi abroad
Main News
‘AKEL harms Cyprob talks for the sake of exercising opposition’
Alithia, Cyprus Mail, Haravgi, Phileleftheros, Politis
Energy, Negotiations Process, External Security, Regional/International Relations
OVERVIEW
The dailies report on statements by Turkey and the TC side on the energy issue but also on the prolonged spat between the government and main opposition AKEL over President Nicos Anastasiades’ intentions as regards the Cyprus problem.
Alithia, Politis and Cyprus Mail also report on the letter Anastasiades sent Guterres whose content was published by Kathimerini on Friday.
According to Phileleftheros, Ankara and the occupied areas are systematically trying to create the impression lately that the GCs are single handedly carrying out research for natural gas and that they have no intention of sharing the proceeds.
This rhetoric is nothing more than a well-orchestrated effort by the Turkish side to push for the energy issues to be put on the negotiations table. Citing statements by Turkish deputy minister for energy Alpaslan Bayraktar and TC ‘foreign minister’ Kudret Ozersay, the daily reports that lately, more and more voices say that Ankara is willing to sit at the negotiations table if energy is included in the talks also using as a pretext the rights of the TCs that must be secured.
The daily reports that Bayraktar sent the message that Turkey is ready to contribute to the political solution of the Cyprus problem if the solution contributes to the equation of the Eastern Mediterranean. Obviously, Turkey is linking the Cyprus problem with the hydrocarbons and wants her demands satisfied in order to contribute to solution efforts, the paper said.
Meanwhile, Ozersay is reinforcing the Turkish rhetoric by arguing that GCs are acting as if they are the sole owners of the hydrocarbons and called for an alternative way of cooperation on this issue, Phileleftheros reported.
According to Politis, the TC side is carrying out its own contacts with the US and UK in connection with the draft report on UNFICYP and discussion by the UN Security Council on the peacekeeping force’s mandate.
Akinci has had meetings with the American Ambassador in Cyprus and the UK High Commissioner to convey the positions of the TC side, the daily reported.
According to the paper, diplomatic sources confirmed that the US and UK are putting pressure on the issue of UNFICYP both on a change in its mandate and linking the presence of the force with political procedures. The TC side believes there is no reason for the continuation of the UNFICYP presence as is, Politis reports.
Alithia, Cyprus Mail, and Politis report on the content of Anastasiades’ letter to Guterres published by Kathimerini. In the letter, whose excerpts were made public by Government spokesman Prodromos Prodromou and Foreign Minister Nikos Christodoulides earlier in the week, Anastasiades accused Turkey of escalating tension in the area by engaging in offensive moves inside the island’s exclusive economic zone thus hampering efforts towards the resumption of negotiations. “I have repeatedly reiterated my commitment to the process and resuming the talks the soonest possible from the point where they were interrupted at the Conference in Crans-Montana,” the president said.
Lack of agreement in the previous months should not discourage us, but strengthen our resolve and efforts to achieve reunification to the benefit of GCs and TCs alike, he said.
Anastasiades reiterated a number of proposals he had tabled aimed at moving the process forward such as the idea of decentralised federation and a Parliamentary System with a permanent ceremonial GC President and TC vice president and a rotating 4:2 Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister who are to be elected by the House of Representatives. Such a system would bring the two communities and the political parties of both constituent states closer together, since there would be a need to forge ideological alliances irrespective of ethnicity, the president said.
Meanwhile, all dailies report on the ongoing spat between AKEL and the government over the letter Anastasiades sent Guterres but also the president’s intentions as regards the Cyprus problem in general.
AKEL said Anastasiades says he is in favour of the relaunch of the talks but in action, he annuls this position. The party argues that Anastasiades’ so-called new ideas are outside the Guterres Framework and therefore annul relevant convergences. His proposal on a decentralised federation means renegotiating federal competencies which have been already agreed, while the position on a parliamentary system reopens the issue of the political system which has also been agreed on, AKEL said.
Insistence on shrinking the TC positive vote just to cabinet-level revokes the relevant convergence agreed on this matter. AKEL also said a decentralised federation does not solve the problem of political equality and effective participation.
Government spokesman Prodromos Prodromou reiterated the content of the letter and pointed out that Anastasiades has not set any conditions for the relaunch of the talks and is merely informing Guterres the GC side would like resumption of talks the soonest possible from where they left off given that the illegal actions by Turkey in Cyprus’ exclusive economic zone stop. This is what has been agreed by the National Council, after all, he said.
Prodromou also said that AKEL, through its narrow logic of opposition, is harming the efforts for a solution by giving the impression that the GC side is also responsible for the machinations of Ankara and the occupation regime, the dailies report.
KEY ACTORS
Bayraktar (Turkish deputy Energy Minister)
>> Turkey will help solve the Cyprob if the solution contributes to the share of East Med natural gas.
Ozersay
>> Instead of GCs acting as if they are the sole owners of hydrocarbons they should agree to an alternative way of solving the energy issue.
Anastasiades
>> Expresses readiness for resumption of talks the soonest possible from the point where they left off in Crans-Montana but Turkey is escalating tension in the area which hampers efforts toward that direction.
>> Lack of agreement in the previous months should not discourage the two sides but rather make them more determined achieve reunification to benefit both GCs and TCs.
>> Reiterates ideas of decentralised federation & parliamentary system with a permanent ceremonial GC President and TC vice president and a rotating PM and Deputy PM elected by the House aiming at unity through ideological alliances irrespective of ethnicity.
AKEL
>> Anastasiades talks the talk but does not walk the walk as regards the Cyprob since his new ideas are not in line with the Guterres Framework and thus annul relevant convergences.
>> Anastasiades’ proposals on a decentralised federation and a parliamentary system and notion of TC positive vote means renegotiating convergences already agreed.
Prodromou
>> Anastasiades has not set any conditions for the relaunch of the talks but rather told UNSG the GC side would like resumption of talks the soonest possible from where they left off but only if Turkey stops its illegal actions in the Cypriot EEZ, as per the National Council decision.
>> Accuses AKEL of harming efforts for a solution for the sake of exercising opposition by giving the wrong impression that the GC side is also responsible for the situation which is due to Ankara’s and the occupation regime’s machinations.
British TC was not allowed to sell property in free areas
Alithia, Politis
Property, Human Rights
OVERVIEW
The dailies report that the Supreme Court rejected on July 2 the appeal filed by a TC woman who has been living in the UK since 1959 who wanted to sell property she owns in Ayios Theodoros village in the Tylliria area to a GC.
The woman who moved to the UK in 1959 and has British citizenship was given the property in question in 2008 by her father who was using that property until 1974 but moved after the war to the occupied areas, the papers report.
She had asked to sell that property a few months after her father gave it to her to a GC but the TC properties Guardian opposed the transaction arguing that her father, who was the initial owner, left his property in 1974.
The woman took the case to court which upheld the Guardian’s decision. She had argued that she was a British citizen thus the law on TC properties does not concern her property.
She then appealed to the Supreme Court that recently ruled that the applicant was under the law a TC since she had automatically acquired the Cypriot citizenship through the Treaty of Establishment of 1959.
Citing a 2008 case law, the Supreme Court said that the law does not link the abandonment of properties in 1974 with their TC property status. It suffices that this concerns property in the government-controlled areas that belongs to a TC, the court ruled, according to the papers.