The decades-long Cyprus dispute dominated yet another meeting of the EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee yesterday, which turned into an ugly slanging match between committee members.
“[EU Minister] Egemen Bagis reminds me of a small salesman. He is waiting idle as he has no customers. There is a saying in Turkish: ‘The idle shopkeeper weighs blah blah.’ I hope you accept this as a joke,” a Greek Cypriot member of the European Parliament (EP), Takis Hadjigeorgiou, said while addressing the committee meeting.
Hadjigeorgiou’s words came in response to remarks by Bagis, who had likened Greek Cypriots to “a stubborn mule.” Bagis was not in the meeting hall when the remarks were delivered.
Accusations continued to be exchanged between Turkish, Greek and Greek Cypriot deputies, to the point where co-chair Hélène Flautre had to intervene. She complained that every meeting became stuck at the Cyprus debate, distancing the talks from their real essence.
Turkish Deputy EU Minister Alaattin Büyükkaya said Greece and Greek Cyprus were always “stopping” Turkey-EU meetings. “Do you represent the European Parliament, or Greece, or the Greek Cypriot administration?” he asked.
In his opening speech, Minister Bagis said Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan would be visiting Brussels on Jan. 21. “We believe that this visit will be beginning of a new era in relations between Turkey and EU,” he stated.
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