two years ago i wrote about how the EU messed up when it set the conditions for allowing cyprus to be admitted into the union. rather than using membership as an incentive for both sides to put aside their differences, it forced a referendum that would effectively reward the greek cypriots by screwing over the turkist cypriots. and so the greek side of the island predictably voted to screw over the turks.
anyway--there's no need to rehash old posts here--my point is that the current controversy with turkey is really just a spillover from that earlier EU fuckup. if the EU had done the 2004 referendum right (with EU membership only extended if both communities voted for unification), cyprus would probably be united today and the island would not be in its current standoff with turkey.
and like a lot of screw-ups, it's not really clear how to get out of the mess that follows. is anyone even talking about the unification of cyprus anymore?
