Political equality between the two communities is a necessary precondition for any solution to the Cyprus problem and is not negotiable as a principle, according to Costas Paraskeva, Professor of Public Law and head of the Law Department at the University of Cyprus. "Anyone who believes there can be a solution to the Cyprus problem without political equality is, I think, simply not talking about a solution," Paraskeva told Politis. What is negotiable, he said, is the content of political equality and the mechanisms that will ensure the state functions and deadlocks are avoided. Political equality comes up in every discussion of the Cyprus problem, but is rarely well understood by the public. Last week, both President Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan referred to it in their speeches at the UN General Assembly. Paraskeva spoke ahead of a public discussion titled "The political equality of the two communities in the Cyprus problem: from theory to practice", organised by the university's Law Department. Fotini Tsiridou, chair of the House legal affairs committee, and Nikitas Hatzimihail, Professor of Private Law, History and Comparative Law at the university, will address the event. The speakers are former foreign minister and former MEP Ioannis Kasoulides, lawyer and international relations expert Toumazos Tselepis, a former member of the negotiating team, former justice minister Anna Koukkides-Procopiou, a Peace Fellow at Yale's Jackson School of Global Affairs, and Paraskeva himself. It will be moderated by Aphrodite Papachristodoulou, lecturer in international human rights law at the university. The discussion will take place on Monday 28 September 2026 at 6.30pm in the university's ceremonial hall at 75 Kallipoleos Street.
Paraskeva said political equality is a clear concept, but agreed that it is very often also used as a slogan. In public debate, he said, it sometimes appears as a self-evident precondition for any solution and sometimes as a threat to democracy and to the functionality of a federal state. For the Turkish Cypriot side in particular, he said, equality appears to be a basic precondition without which it will never accept an agreement. "In reality, the concept answers a fundamental question: whether Turkish Cypriots will participate in the common state as a minority with guaranteed rights, or as a partner in the exercise of power. Of course, political equality means the second," he said.
A concept that dates back to 1960
Paraskeva rejected the widespread impression among Greek Cypriots that political equality was imposed on them after the invasion. A first form of political equality between the two communities was agreed in Zurich in 1959 and enshrined in the 1960 Constitution, he said. The Constitution introduced bicommunality, the sharing of power between the two communities, as a fundamental element of the state. It raised the Turkish population minority to the status of a community and gave it significant political rights in the functioning of the state. "Of course, after the Turkish invasion of 1974, the insistence on an equal partnership became the permanent hallmark of the Turkish Cypriot negotiating position," he said. The term "political equality" was established later, in UN texts from the 1990s, "but the substance existed from the first day of the Republic of Cyprus and was reflected in the 1960 Constitution."
That equality was not numerical, Paraskeva said. The House of Representatives, the Council of Ministers and the civil service were composed on a 70:30 ratio and the army on a 60:40 ratio, leaving the Greek Cypriot community with a clear majority in all state bodies. The equality of the two communities lay elsewhere: in the equivalent power of the President and Vice-President to exercise a final veto on foreign affairs, defence and security, in their separate election by each community from separate electoral rolls, in the separate majorities required in the House for electoral, municipal and tax laws, and in the communal autonomy exercised by the Communal Chambers.
Asked whether the 1960 arrangement collapsed because of political equality, Paraskeva said there was no doubt that the disagreement over political equality was at the centre of the constitutional crisis that followed, but that it would be wrong to say it caused the crisis on its own. The survival of the goals of enosis and partition, the illegal organisations on both sides and intercommunal violence all played a role. He cautioned against the easy, stereotypical reading that the system was doomed to fail from the start. "Why hide the fact that the Greek Cypriot side had objections to this form of equality from very early on and challenged it? It was clear that it did not accept bicommunality and power-sharing in the form and to the degree that it was shaped in Zurich and ultimately enshrined in the 1960 Constitution," he said. This does not absolve the Turkish Cypriot side of its own responsibility, he added, since it also used the constitutional mechanisms as leverage on issues unrelated to their purpose. Turkish Cypriot MPs, for example, used the right of separate majority not only against arbitrary conduct by the Greek Cypriot community on tax laws, but also on other pending issues such as the 70:30 quota in the civil service and separate municipalities.
What the UN means by political equality
The concept acquired specific content in the UN Secretary-General's report of 8 March 1990 (S/21183), which the Security Council adopted in Resolution 716 of 11 October 1991. According to that report, Paraskeva said, political equality does not mean equal numerical participation in all bodies of the federal state. It must, however, be reflected in four elements, among others: the requirement that the federal constitution be approved or amended with the agreement of both communities, the effective participation of both communities in all bodies and decisions of the federal government, safeguards to ensure the federal government cannot take measures against the interests of either community, and the equality and identity of the powers and competences of the two constituent states.
In practice, he said, this means the two constituent states will have the same status, with each holding the same competences as the other. In the federal bodies, both communities will take part, not with numerical equality but with effective participation. "And this is precisely where the greatest difficulty of the whole undertaking lies," Paraskeva said. If decisions of the federal bodies are taken by majority, the participation of the smaller community will not be effective. If, on the other hand, every decision requires the participation of both communities, the smaller community's participation will be effective, but this may make the state dysfunctional. "We experienced this to some extent in 1963. Safeguards must therefore be found that reduce and/or eliminate the risk of dysfunction," he said.
Paraskeva described the positive vote, meaning at least one vote from each community for a decision at federal government level, and the rotating presidency as tools that could help put political equality into practice. He urged great caution, however, and said these tools should also be examined in light of the experience of 1960 to 1963, when the two communities shared state power. It must be seen, he said, how narrowly the area requiring dual consent, or a positive vote from both communities, is defined, and whether the positive vote will express the will of the community or simply that of an individual representative. "And perhaps most importantly: what happens when consensus is not achieved? It is therefore of the utmost importance to find a reliable and effective deadlock-resolution mechanism so that the state is not led into paralysis," he said.
On concerns that a dysfunctional federal government would affect citizens' daily lives, Paraskeva pointed to an aspect he said is often overlooked. In a federation where the constituent states have extensive powers, the quality of daily life will depend mainly on the competence and capacity of the local government, and any dysfunction at the centre would have little effect on citizens' everyday lives or on economic development. "This does not, of course, justify indifference to the functionality of the central state. But I think it puts the fear into its proper perspective," he said.
Not negotiable in principle
Paraskeva said political equality has been established in UN Security Council resolutions since the early 1990s and is a necessary precondition for any solution. He dismissed criticism that it is the antechamber to a confederation, saying such criticism confuses two different things. Political equality will operate within a state with a single sovereignty, a single international personality and a single citizenship, as provided for in the 1977 and 1979 high-level agreements and the relevant UN resolutions. "In other words, political equality concerns the way the communities will participate in the common state, not the right to leave it, which is something sovereign equality might give them, and that cannot be accepted," he said.
The lesson of 1960
Asked to sum up the lesson of 1960 for a future solution, Paraskeva said it is not enough to agree that the two communities are politically equal. "A state must be designed and built within which political equality can work. 1960 showed us what happens when there are strong protective rights without adequate deadlock-resolution mechanisms and without the necessary political acceptance," he said. A new agreement must avoid both extremes: neither should the majority be able to govern permanently while ignoring the smaller community, nor should the smaller community be able to block the functioning of the state without an institutional way out. The hardest part of a solution, he suggested, may be agreeing on the rules by which equality will be turned into everyday governance. "A constitution can provide for balances. However, for these balances to work, something is needed that it will not be enough simply to write into its articles. What is required, in other words, is political acceptance of the very idea of partnership."
