EU must act over Erdogan’s push for a ‘blue homeland’

By Dr Louisa Borg Haviaras

Half of the Aegean Sea and the maritime area up to eastern Crete are part of Turkey’s ‘blue homeland’ concept, maintained, supported and promoted by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government.

The map of Ankara’s desires shows what Erdogan means by this ‘blue homeland’ which covers an area of 462,000 square kilometres incorporating the sea around the eastern Aegean islands, the Dodecanese, a sea area east of Crete and part of the Cyclades.

Erdogan leaves no doubt when he states that Turkey is determined to overcome all barriers that threaten his country in northern Syria, Iraq and the eastern Mediterranean. He appears as the champion of the rights of Turks and Turkish Cypriots which he believes are violated. His country invaded Cyprus in 1974 and since then controls more than a third of the island. He seems to forget the rights of the Greek Cypriots on an island inhabited predominantly by them, owners of the greatest extent of land and bearers of the greater burden of public expenditure. I wonder whether the term minority applies only to Turkish Cypriots. Minorities existed and exist in Turkey too.

Of course Turkey took care of its minorities. Several hundred thousand Ottoman Greeks died during World War I and the years that followed. Those who survived the atrocities of Turkey found refuge in Greece and the nearby Greek islands. The Christian Ottoman Greeks who populated Turkey’s eastern provinces of Anatolia, the Greek Pontic people, had a worse fate. In addition Turkey took care of its Armenians too of which around one million people perished. The Greek, the Greek Pontic mass killings and the Armenian genocide enabled Turkey to create a new Turkish ethnonational country. Still Turkey has another minority to take care of, that of the Kurds who constitute the largest ethnic minority in the country and who comprise between 15 and 20 per cent of its population. Until a few years ago Turkey denied even their existence and continues to ignore the very rights that it so proudly champions for Turkish Cypriots.

The ‘blue homeland’ is a concept that claims vast parts of the Aegean and Mediterranean seas and which include Greek and Cypriot maritime borders and hydrocarbon deposits. Erdogan’s selective memory speaks of the restoration to their country of any territory formerly belonging to it. However if we wish to speak of a blue homeland then why don’t we go a bit further back, prior to 1922? In 1914 Great Britain annexed Cyprus and such annexation was recognised by Turkey in Article 20 of the Treaty of Lausanne of 1923, under which ‘Turkey hereby recognises the annexation of Cyprus proclaimed by the British on the 5th November, 1914’  also ‘Turkey by Article 16 of the same Treaty of Lausanne has renounced any right or title over Cyprus and by Article 27 of the same Treaty diversed itself of the exercise of any power or jurisdiction in political, legislative or administrative matter over the nationals of Cyprus’.

However although Cyprus was declared as an independent sovereign republic on August 16, 1960, the Treaty of Guarantee subjects the country to the will of the guaranteeing powers, depriving it of its internal independence and territorial supremacy. That gave the excuse to Turkey to invade the country on the pretext to restore peace, a reason given in justification of its military action, expelling around 150,000 people from their houses and properties.

It is high time the world community stopped pacifying and soothing Erdogan. The policy of appeasement and the granting of political concessions to an aggressive Turkey can only lead to trouble. History offers glaring examples of major European powers which failed to confront German expansionism in Europe, Italian aggression in Africa and Japanese policy in China during the build-up to World War Two. While the West and countries of the European Union disagree over how to react to Turkey’s aggressive foreign policy and do not consider imposing sanctions on a country that violates Greek airspace on a daily basis, Erdogan continues his efforts to popularise belligerent and irredentist territorial claims.

Now at a time when the United Nations are trying to convene a meeting of parties in the Cyprus dispute in Geneva in late April, it is time to make all efforts to unite Cyprus. It is high time for Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots to live peacefully together like they did in the past respecting each other’s rights and each other’s place in history.

Cyprus came under many conquerors – Assyrians, Egyptians, Persians, Romans, Franks, Venetians, Turks and British – following its colonisation by Greek colonists in the second millennium BC Conquerors come and go. However, the people remain and should be able to live in peace and dream of a better future for their families and children regardless of origin and religion.

• Dr Louisa Borg Haviaras holds a PhD from Oxford Brookes University