When it comes to energy projects, the credibility rating of Cyprus governments is depressingly low. If there is one department in which there has been real continuity between the Anastasiades government and the current one, it is in maintaining the low credibility rating of declarations about energy. We still cannot take seriously anything we are told either by the government or the announcements of the so-called trilateral alliances which produce a lot of words and little else.

Last week, the trilateral alliance of Cyprus, Greece and Israel met in Athens in its 3+1 format which includes the United States. This trilateral was set up many years ago and in all the years that followed it has agreed nothing tangible; in fact, such is the understanding fostered by this alliance that Cyprus and Israel have still not resolved, after more than a decade of negotiations, how the natural gas in two adjacent plots in the sea should be divided.

On Thursday, the 3+1 gathering confirmed the commitment of the three countries to strengthen the energy security and stability in the eastern Mediterranean. At the centre of the talks of the four energy ministers, said an official announcement, was the further development of the Eastern Mediterranean Energy Centre while they repeated their support for connectivity projects, including the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC).

In the joint declaration, the ministers also agreed that their countries “will further utilise the 3+1 formula for the promotion of the diversifying of energy sources and reducing dependence on malign actors.” They also confirmed their commitment for further cooperation on energy infrastructures that connect Europe to Israel with the aim of strengthening energy independence.

These are the familiar platitudes that we have been served for years. It suffices to say that in spite of these alliances, Cyprus is still nowhere near extracting any natural gas from its EEZ. A private energy company might bring some natural gas to Cyprus from an Israeli gas field, but apart from this nothing of practical value has been undertaken.

Even the mention of energy infrastructures that connect Europe to Israel is vague. Is the 3+1 meeting referring to the East Med pipeline that was supposed to take gas from the eastern Mediterranean to Greece, but most experts have dismissed as unviable? Or perhaps it was a reference to the Great Sea Interconnector that will bring electricity from Crete to Cyprus and on to Israel, if the Cyprus and Greece government put aside their disagreements about the project.

Speaking about 3+1, President Christodoulides said the energy sector could be used to build close cooperation with other countries. “It is a sector which is also a key pillar of our foreign policy,” he said on Saturday, also revealing that “in this direction, we will have new developments to announce.”

We have had enough of announcements, declarations and developments regarding energy. It is time our energy policy moved from the theoretical sphere to the practical one.