The Limits of Self-Determination and the Cases of Forced Separatism: the Example of Northern Cyprus

Open Journal of Political Science, 2016, 6, 161-167 Published Online April 2016 in SciRes. http://www.scirp.org/journal/ojps http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ojps.2016.62015 The Limits of Self-Determination and the Cases of Forced Separatism: The Example of Northern Cyprus Andreas Yfantidis Department of International & European Studies, University of Piraeus, Piraeus, Greece Received 11 June 2015; accepted 11 April 2016; published 14 April 2016 Copyright © 2016 by author and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY). http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Abstract In the current essay, the writer will try to approach the cases of separatism and especially those of illegal separatism which are creating unrecognized or partially recognized states. It is true though that these cases, even of forced separatism, are matter which has been subjected to the international law and mainly to the principle of the security of a minority group and finally the right to self-determination. Although the principle of self-determination is respected under the Charter of the United Nations (article 1§2), it is still rather vague to define what kind of group is subjected to it. The Charter doesn’t provide much information about it and keeps the Wilsonian concept of “self-determination for people”, therefore cases of separatism are still under broad and heated debate. Although this paper will focus on the case of forced separatism in Cyprus and especially the case of Northern Cyprus, which has been separated from the Cypriot mainland after the Tur- kish invasion of 20th July 1974 and has proclaimed to be the independent “Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus”1 after 1983. Moreover I will try to focus on the aspects of the separatist arguments posed from the Turkish community for protection from the Greek paramilitary forces and the fact of the invasion which made the whole territory an occupied territory (S/RES/550, 1984) rather than an independent state coming from a legitimate secessionist movement. Hence the arguments and the methodology followed in this paper will move in a dialectic path by highlighting first of all the historical aspects of the case of Cyprus from 1878 and the British rule over the isl- and. Afterwards we will mention the arguments supporting the cases of legitimate secessionism and we will attempt to give a possible definition of illegal and forced separatism which are carried out after invasions and territorial claims that are made under the safeguard clause of the United Nations Covenant of Friendly relations of 1970. These claims are tightly connected to the-so called but disputable remedial right to secessionism. The remedial right of secessionism is pleaded when the central government is adopting a discriminatory behavior against to a minority group with specific religious or racial characteristics by following strict political, economic and social policies 1Kuzey Kıbrıs Türk Cumhuriyeti in Turkish language. How to cite this paper: Yfantidis, A. (2016). The Limits of Self-Determination and the Cases of Forced Separatism: The Ex- ample of Northern Cyprus. Open Journal of Political Science, 6, 161-167. http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/ojps.2016.62015 A. Yfantidis on this community (Buchanan, 1997). Keywords Separatism, International Community, United Nations, Interventionism, Cypriot Issue 1. Introduction Cyprus was part of the Ottoman Empire after the Ottoman-Venetian war of 1570 as an Eyelet2 till 1878 and when the British Empire signed the Cyprus convention during the Congress of Berlin with the Ottoman side which assigned Cyprus as a protectorate to British Empire with the return of political and military support of Britain to Ottomans in the case that Russia would attack and annex Ottoman provinces in Asia (such as Kars, Batum and Ardahan) (Annex to Convention of Defensive Alliance, Gr. Br-Trk, 1878). After the declaration of war from Britain to Ottoman Empire in 5th October 1914, the crown annexed Cyprus and in the Treaty of Lau- sanne on 24th July 1923, the newly formed Republic of Turkey recognized full sovereign rights of Britain on Cyprus (article 20) and in 1925 Cyprus officially became “colony of the Crown” and afterwards the story of the two communities (Greek and Turkish) is starting. The demographic facts coming from the British side concerning the period show that in 1881, 95% of the Muslim population was Turkish speaking, although the 73.9% of the whole island’s population was Greek and only the 24.4% was Turkish (Hatay, 2007). But in 1920, a year of great changes in the Greek-Turkish relation- ship due to the invasion of Greek army to Minor Asia one year before, a lot of Muslims migrated to Turkey and asked for Turkish citizenship for 2 main reasons. Τhe first was the fact that they were abandoned from the offi- cial project of nation building in Cyprus and the other was that they wanted to participate in the reform era of the Kemalist regime. After the annexation of Cyprus from Britain the Greek population of the island starting to de- velop and reached a number of 244,887 when the whole population of the island was 310,000. It was an increase of 5% of the Greek community while the Turkish community dropped to 19.6% of the whole population (Chat- zilira, 2009). The story of the two communities is the most important as it indicates the procedures of nation-building in Cyprus as well as the attempts from the Greek community to maintain control over the island, be independent from the British crown and chase the possibility of uniting with the Kingdom of Greece under the motto of Eno- sis3. The case of the Greek Cypriot community is much closer to cases of secessionism subjected to remedial rightscompared to the Turkish Cypriot claims that we will check later (Buchanan, 1997). The revolutions and mainly protests took place in October 1931 (Oktovriana) when the Greek community opposed to the British government under the leadership of the Archbishop Kitios Nikolaos, the MP Stavros Stavrinakis and the ambas- sador Zinon Rossidis. The British government responded negatively to the self-determination claims of the Greek community and the Greek people believed that this was a pure act of repression of the right for self-governance and self-determination in their own territory. Although these events took place in Cyprus, the international context was against Greece and a possible unification of Cyprus with Greece. After the Minor Asia war ended with the military loss of Greece from Turkey and a series of events till 1932, it was impossible either for the Greek community of Cyprus or even for the Greek government to make any further claims which would be against the interest of the British Empire, as they were the biggest economical, political and military ally to Greece. Although it was understandable mainly by the Greek Cypriots that the time for independence was close, their hopes became true after the 5-year armed conflict with the British forces during 1955-1959. The paramilitary group of EOKA (Εthinki Organosi Kyprion Agoniston) organized from the Greek general G. Grivas was the main resistance force against the British authority. On the other hand, the Turkish side also created a paramilitary force that kept close ties with the Turkish army under the name “Volkan” which later on was renamed as Tur- kish Resistance Organization (TMT). These two groups played a significant role in the future formation of the 2Cyprus was part of the Serenissima Republica di Venezia when Turkish raids to the island begun from 1489 till the late 16th century. Even when the Ottoman fleet was defeated in the Battle of Lepanto, the island of Cyprus had fallen in the hands of the Ottoman Empire. 3In English it means Union and in Greek it’s written as Ένωσις (Enosis-Unification) in the old form of Greek language, before the language reformation of 1978. This was the main motto and request of the protesters to the British Government. 162 A. Yfantidis two communities as well as in the strict national separation between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots. The Political Instability between the Turkish and the Greek Community Tensions between the two communities started after the fight for the independence of Cyprus from the United Kingdom which was finally achieved at 16th of August 1960 after the signature of the Tripartite London-Zurich agreements. The so called agreement of Zurich was the base for the Cypriot constitution which although was partially recognized as the island was partitioned in the Greek Cypriot region and the Turkish Cypriot region in 1963 because of the intercommunal violence between the EOKA pro-unionist with Greece paramilitary group and the TMT which was a pro-separatist paramilitary group. The conflict between these two armed groups of the communities many times led to deadly conflicts. After these events the Archbishop Makarios, who was the leader of the Cypriot government, proposed the so called 13 amendments which had been refused by the Turkish side as unacceptable. Even though the constitution had clear provisions about the equality of the two communities there was unrest coming from the Turkish Cypriot community about the leadership and the relations with the Republic of Turkey. Also the Greek side claimed even before these agreements that Turkish Cypriot minority group had too many rights on the governance of the newly existing state (Brinkley, 1989). These tensions were starting to put a lot of obstacles in the bicommunal affairs as both parties were adopting stricter positions on the same issue. Most important attempts happened from the Greek-Cypriots when they pressed under the Archbi- shop Makarios, who was the head of the Cypriot government, to unify with Greece under the motto of “Enosis”.

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