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Should Cyprus maintain
its foreign policy orientation only with the EU or should it also
establish a constructive cooperation with the North Atlantic
Treaty Organisation through participation in the Partnership for Peace (PfP)?
It
is expected that the
creation of an Atlantic identity for
Cyprus
would increase its ability in policy implementation. As such, Cyprus
will also reintegrate and re-orientate its foreign and security
relations based on its national interest needs, while keeping its
balance with the EU. Within this broader framework issues with Turkey
may be addressed effectively.
Politically, militarily and operationally, while NATO is seeking a new
Strategic Concept that is to be decided at the next Portugal Summit in
2010, European members will be asked to establish and re-establish
relations with NATO. A new form of EU-NATO cooperation from all member
states (including
Cyprus) in a pure security form, should
supplement the efforts made by NATO at this time but also the EU,
post-Lisbon Treaty. At the same time, national interests of member
states shall be restructured for the recreation of the Euro-Atlantic
balance. This entails the effective implementation of the Lisbon Treaty
at the level of the CFSP and NATO’s new Strategic Concept to be
ratified. The creation of a robust new European Strategic Dogma, shall
draw the lines on where each Organization would be involved and under
which circumstances; this arrangement will also take into consideration
the expected New Strategic Concept of NATO. As such, what the US and
NATO had sought shall be agreed upon: to avoid ’a duplication of
operations and efforts’. A new European dogma will supplement efforts of
NATO and will also increase practically the future fields of operations
of the “Foreign Minister of the EU” but also the role of European forces
that come second to NATO’s forces under Petersberg tasks and the
Berlin Plus Agreements. NATO shall come first, as the future may
include the military right to the rules of engagement,
under UN Security Council
decisions.
Needless to say, no concrete co-operation as agreed on the NATO-EU
chapter about their relations can be viable, if any of the involved
parties decide to withdraw from future joint co-operations. Existing
EU-NATO relations can only be sustained, increased or altered, in terms
of their objectives and liabilities of their operations. Therefore, it
would seem as only natural, that the formation of a new NATO strategic
concept can actually be interpreted as a “road map” for the creation of
a new European Strategic Dogma. It will supplement existing efforts made
on the level of EU-NATO co-operation objectives.
For
both organizations to be successful in implementing their objectives in
the Euro-Atlantic sphere, understanding should be exhibited to all
countries that are not part of both organizations. Cyprus, a member state of the European Union, does not yet have
an Atlantic identity. This however, does not necessarily
mean that Cyprus is not
willing or does not fulfil all conditions that are to be met, in order
to have an Atlantic identity; whether there are agreements based on the
Berlin Plus process of NATO-EU relations, or otherwise to the
requirements of the Partnership for Peace.
Cyprus seems to already fulfil the operational and military conditions
that need to be met as well as the political requirements necessary to
join the PfP. Practically what is needed, is:
1)
political will and the national consensus first to negotiate an Atlantic
future for Cyprus;
2)
the ability of Cyprus
to address effectively the Cyprus
question and to simultaneously
create a foreign and defense relations road map that will raise the
country’s status into the geo-strategic chessboard, just like the Helsinki decisions of 1999.
The
fact that Cyprus is near the Middle East geographically, is of
importance as it can address supranational security needs. The
involvement of Great Britain strengthens the geo-strategic importance of
the land. Most EU countries except Cyprus are already members of NATO
and therefore can support a proposal for Cyprus’ integration to the PfP
based on the global needs. Turkey cannot therefore go against
global security needs that it too has been sharing since its accession
to NATO in 1952.
The
possibility of Turkey
vetoing Cyprus’
application is very real, yet this would conflict with
Turkey’s
efforts to portray itself as a true European country. At the same time
it does not hold the moral excuses and legal reasoning to go against
Cyprus integration to the PfP given the need for closer global
co-operation. PfP membership entails the introduction to a political and
military forum of negotiations and co-operation based on the Atlantic
values. In such a case the Cyprus issue is integrated on the
Euro-Atlantic forum for even closer negotiations with Turkey; which
makes the subject a win-win
situation for both.
Cyprus
can join the PfP at the level that its national government so requires
and at the level of the acknowledged interests of its foreign policy
agenda. At the same time, Cyprus’s
application could also provide the positive outcome that it wishes to
advance a win-win
situation for all concerned: global security co-operation under the
auspices of the EU, NATO and in the context of a UN settlement to the Cyprus problem.
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