Cyprus is a singular place in the middle of Europe, Asia, and the Middle East—a small island whose geopolitical importance exceeds its size. It has been a military and geopolitical powder keg for decades, its Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot partition a reminder of the Cold War and future aspirations.
Its partition dates back to the close of British colonial rule and subsequent uncertainty. In 1974, following a Greek-supported coup aimed at annexing Cyprus to Greece, about one-third of the island was occupied by Turkish forces. This produced the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) acknowledged solely by Ankara, and the Green Line administered by the UN—a buffer separating Nicosia from the island.
Displacement, property, and ethnic polarization politics have been on, and continue to influence, politics, negotiations, and deployments up to the present. Turkey reacted to Cyprus in a real-time and dynamic fashion.
Turkey’s ‘Blue Homeland’ (Mavi Vatan) policy, in fact, breaks down into claims over vast expanses of seabed, at times in violation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and legally recognized Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs) of Cyprus, Greece, and other regional states. Paper constraints are not the situation here; there is a desire to balance local players, to dominate energy resources, and to place Turkey on the map of the Eastern Mediterranean in this policy. Hardening policy appeared in Ankara’s approaches to a two-state resolution of Cyprus.
Turkish decision-makers, since October 2020, have ruled out the previous federal reunification offer on a positive note. Steps like opening sections of Varosha, the beach resort holiday town closed off since 1974 and deserted ever since, are instances of hardening policy. These actions, unlike UN decisions, have the consequence of hardening Turkey’s hold in the north and compelling the international community to move. The hydrocarbon reserves complicate matters in the tensions.
Cyprus has signed EEZs with Egypt, Lebanon, and Israel to support its sea and terrestrial claims and in an effort to encourage cooperation in the region. The favour has not been reciprocated by Turkey, whose ad hoc arrangements with other allies, such as Libya shut off the economic future of the island, apart from that of regional energy security, such as European efforts at diversifying supplies. Illegal drilling, belligerent activities, and political pronouncements make it highly inflammable. Responses around the world were diverse.
The United Nations, the European Union, and France all denounced aggressive actions in Varosha and general claims on the sea. The United Kingdom, the sole proprietor of the bases and guarantor of the 1960 Guarantee Treaty, has everything to gain by taking no chances.
Recent UK leader visits indicate potential expanded economic cooperation between Cyprus and the UK, but entail risk through ongoing tensions. Israel visited Greece and Cyprus, which share the aggressive stance of Turkey but who, in their own turn, also wish to counterbalance its own regional ambitions.
Cyprus’s destiny is at stake. Turkish deployments such as UAVs and sea bases in northern Cyprus are worsening tensions and threats of annexation. In the south, the country is building ties with Western and regional allies, and this is making the security situation more complicated. Turkish domestic imperatives, from economic imperatives to political vulnerability, function to drive the stakes higher inasmuch as Cyprus is a nationalist cause.
Finally, the destiny of Cyprus will be at the nexus of domestic, regional players, and the international community’s agenda of norm-imposition. Partitioning of the island is a mini template for more extensive sovereignty, law, and influence wars in the wider Eastern Mediterranean.
As long as grand expansionist desires are avoided and court and cut-and-dried answers are avoided, Cyprus will be at the center of a heightened, dynamic geopolitical chessboard.