Notes from The Land of Absurdities (Cyprus): My Properties are mine and so are yours!

"How Happy to Say I'm a Turk"; the comical translation of one of the favorite utterings of Ataturk. It is placed by the Kermiya check-point. The militarist, chavunist thinking greets everyone who crosses the check-point. How nice it is to tell people about the real-face of our government, right at the points of entry.

I knew about it but I could not believe it. A rush for property sales in northern shores of Cyprus. Mass amounts of property being sold to foreigners. Since I knew that Annan plan was not being implemented, it was hard to imagine it. Apparently, it was happening despite the outcome of the Annan process. It was quite lively. Billboards, advertisements and recently Internet spamming.

What is absurd about this situation is the fact that Turkish Cypriots -- just like they often do -- walk around in the streets and condemn it while shaking their heads but they do *nothing* about it. Naively thinking, there is nothing wrong with it. But add the fact that a bulk of these properties are believed to be those of Greek Cypriots. Add to this that it happening at a time when there is an ongoing normalization of the relationship between two communities. Furthermore, add to this that the so-called "anti-status quo" government of Talat, as impersonated by Talat himself, says "[t]he sales are lawful activity and it is not possible to stop them " that he can not interfere with property provisions enshrined in the TRNC constitution (Cyprus Weekly, accessed on September 6th, 2004). Mr Anti-Status Quo believes that by rejecting the Annan plan the Greek Cypriot community gave up their rights to many things including this property issue. Apparently, Talat has no shame when he says "Turkish Cypriots approved this plan, Greek Cypriots said no by the guidance of the Greek Cypriot government, so now, I believe that the Greek Cypriot government is responsible for this infringement, or at least they share the responsibility." A brand new approach to the understanding of people's rights.

I can't see how this is different from saying "by participating in the coup, they called for the Turkish invasion and therefore, lost their rights". Rings some bells? So Talat's properties are his but Greek Cypriot properties are also his.

He wants to keep the borders intact since he is against a "salami solution" -- how times have we heard Denktash say that? He thinks that a pull out of the Turkish army is dangerous because it would give Greek Cypriots tools to carry out their propaganda. I suppose he is forgetting that the main function of the Turkish army in our homeland has been to step on our rights for decades. He used to complain about this himself in the past. Well, this makes sense, since he says that the Greek Cypriot side is not the "free areas" but rather it is the "hostage area". He has forgotten to say anything about whether north is "free" or not.

During my trip back home, I was looking around. I wanted to see change and there was plenty of it. What was missing, however, was democratization of north Cyprus. A lot of new, modern rhetoric was plenty but action was missing. To me this is absurd. It is absurd to shunt different voices while pretending to be a champion of democracy. It is more absurd to use this position to prolong violation of basic, human and humanitarian rights.

What else, other than being a chavunist and an updated puppet of the decades old game in Cyprus, can make Talat say such words? (*)

(*) I *do* have a few ideas about that but I leave it open.

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