From the moment the official visit of President Nikos Christodoulides to the White House for a meeting with President Joe Biden was announced, the president, his spokesmen and their media supporters have been feeding us with a continuous stream of assessments of its significance and ultra positive consequences for Cyprus. The frenzied, positive spinning of the meeting has been unrelenting.
Its marketing of the meeting and the efforts to turn it into a ground-breaking event were so lacking in a sense of perspective, it was difficult to take them seriously. The impression created was that much more significance than actually existed was being given to the one-hour meeting at the White House, which was granted to Christodoulides in recognition of his drive to build closer relations with the United States ever since his election – not to mention his very helpful stance on Israel. He has undoubtedly succeeded in this respect, as the agreements and the strategic dialogue between the two countries testify.
Was the meeting a “historic milestone” as the government spokesman said on Friday? In the sense that Christodoulides was the first Cyprus president to be invited to the White House in 28 years, and only the third since independence, it may have had a minor historic element. That it was a symbolic confirmation of the new era in US-Cyprus relations, more so, but there was no hiding the fact that, in reality, this was a courtesy call, that had no real, political agenda. How could it? Joe Biden is a lame-duck president, seeing out the last two months of his term in office, while on Tuesday Americans will elect a new president.
Yet this did not stop Christodoulides and his spokesmen coming up with important-sounding assessments of the meeting. According to what Christodoulides said, after the meeting, Biden thanked “the Cyprus Republic for the role we are playing in the region, and you understand the significance of this role being recognised by the US and the American president.” There was also “intense interest by the US about the need for resumption of talks,” which was linked to “developments in the region by the US,” said Christodoulides.
On Friday, speaking in Thessaloniki, the president returned to the significance of the meeting, saying that “the American president publicly felt the need to reconfirm the basis of the Cyprus settlement, based on the resolutions of the United Nations,” adding that they discussed how the US would contribute to a settlement of the Cyprus problem. The reality is that the US of Joe Biden cannot contribute anything because Biden’s presidency is in effect over and his successor might have no interest in a Cyprus settlement.
Earlier on the same day, an unnamed government source was telling journalists in Nicosia that the meeting with Biden did not only focus on the Cyprus problem, but the role Cyprus could play in the broader region – a theme that was also heavily marketed. “This does not mean that the Cyprus problem has been sidelined,” said the unnamed source, “rather it shows that Cyprus now has the capacity to engage in a range of regional issues.” Of course, Cyprus was not seeking to “match Turkey’s power,” but it was establishing itself on its own merits. The source, however, did mention that the day the visit was announced was significant – October 29 was the day of the Turkish Republic – and no coincidence.
The “upgraded role” of Cyprus and its ability “to engage in a range of regional issues” was the other major positive of the White House meeting according to the government. The big question is why a tiny country with no real power like Cyprus, would want to engage in regional issues? What does Cyprus have to gain from engaging in regional issues and its enhanced diplomatic/geostrategic/regional role? Having ideas above our capabilities could only lead to trouble for the country, which has neither the military power nor the diplomatic standing to play any role.
Is it not enough to be content that relations with the US have improved to such an extent that we are now considered a reliable ally and having a strategic dialogue on building even stronger ties? The invitation to the White House was recognition of the big part played by Christodoulides in building stronger relations and his supportive role regarding Israel -nothing more. Why the government insists on reading greater significance than this into the meeting, is really difficult to comprehend, because there is no need for it.
Christodoulides should stop selling the absurd idea that the US invitation “proves, among many other things, the important role the Cyprus Republic is playing in the broader region of the Eastern Mediterranean.” The US has a real interest, now, in having good relations with the Republic not because of any significant role Cyprus is playing, as the government suggests, but because of its geographic location. Its proximity to one of the world’s most unstable regions, where a war has been raging for the last year, makes Cyprus a very useful country for the US. Conditions shape relations between countries, and Christodoulides, to his credit, saw this opportunity and took full advantage of it. That’s all.
