Reading Gönül Tol’s opinion piece “Don’t cut Turkey out of defence efforts because of Erdoğan” (June 24),
I at first found it logical and rational. But on second thoughts, I wondered whether Turkey was playing a cunning game of trying to be a neutral state. Indeed, I can’t envisage a situation where Turkey would support a Nato action and fight Russia for the sake of say northern European nations like Finland or Sweden.
On the contrary, Turkey will use any leverage it has over Europe to its advantage. Will the price be paid by Greece in the Aegean or by Cyprus? This is how it goes, unfortunately.
But the EU was set up to prevent just such a scenario. Underpinning that project is the principle that big countries can no longer bully small ones, or change borders at will but will have to use diplomacy and not war to resolve territorial disputes.
Otherwise we’re back to the situation that prevailed before the second world war, or in our case, in Cyprus, to what happened in 1974, when might — Turkish might — was right and the island was forcibly partitioned.
So, post-Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Turkey must understand this clearly. The old ways are dead. Then perhaps it could be Turkey that is invited to join the EU.
Christos Rotsas
Former MP, Nicosia, Cyprus