By Andreas D. Mavroyiannis

“We do not improve the weather by smashing the barometer”

Jacques Prévert

This year marks 80 years since the founding of the United Nations, which, out of the ashes of war, aspired to embody the principle of “never again” and the vision of a better and fairer world.

However positive the record may be, it surely falls short of the great expectations placed on organized multilateral cooperation and international law, not only for the prohibition of the threat or use of force in international relations, but also for the advent of collective security and prosperity. These constitute a supreme achievement of human civilization, intertwined with the very notion of law, justice, and the rule of law in an interdependent, globalized society. Their ambition was, and still is, to moderate relations of power and to foster collective action for the common good, for peaceful coexistence, for development, for the peaceful settlement of international disputes, for human rights and humanitarian concerns, for achieving the goals of sustainable development, and so on.cyprus

Of course, there is no panacea, no deus ex machina, only an endless, titanic effort and teleological dedication and determination in the face of challenges and adversity.

Return of Power Politics

Yet, in recent times, international relations have entered a critical juncture, dominated by approaches that recall eras we wanted to believe had been left behind forever.

While the development of institutionalized international cooperation, of rules and principles of peaceful coexistence, and of joint efforts to confront major challenges, with all its deficits, imperfections, constraints, and weaknesses, seemed to be on an irreversible course toward consolidation, it is now under frontal assault, in the name of the law of the strong. There is an ongoing attempt to dismantle its acquis, and existential dilemmas are multiplying. Whether in the approaches of President Trump, President Putin, Prime Minister Netanyahu, or others on perhaps a smaller scale, the landscape being shaped is terrifying. A war of all against all, as described by Hobbes, and a logic of “if you can do it, do it,” which fully drags us into the law of the jungle.

What is perhaps more infuriating even than these tragic observations is the carefree alignment with similar logics, as we see lately even with our own President of the Republic and his sleight-of-hand analysis of the theory of “converging interests” and the justification of the appalling silence, or even cover-up, of brutal atrocities, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, all in the name of aligning with the interests of the powerful, or some of them, preferably the mightiest of them, supposedly as protection and a means of maximizing our national interests, including the solution of the Cyprus problem, where international law and the UN have proven ineffective (sic!!!).

But appeasing or attempting to exorcise the beast is nothing but complicity and submission. Servility is not rewarded, it is despised. If we wish to call ourselves civilized, and if we hold even the most basic values and principles, let us at least not become accomplices, nor turn our gaze away.

Here in Cyprus, we have an even greater duty to protect the only tools in the hands of the international community, the system of collective security, the principles and values of the Charter and international law.

Already from the 1950s, however, instead of efforts being directed toward the right of self-determination, we wasted ourselves in an illusion that pursuing enosis (union with Greece) was possible within the framework of the western alliance and Cold War fantasies. After a given independence, when President Kennedy dissuaded Makarios from seeking NATO membership on the basis of a “gentlemen’s agreement” between Karamanlis and Menderes, Cyprus turned to the Non-Aligned Movement to claim sovereign equality and non-intervention in internal affairs. Security Council Resolution 186 came to confirm the international standing, legality, and connection of the Republic of Cyprus with international law, our State. Since then, the internationalization of the Cyprus problem has relied on international legality under the UN Charter, on values and principles, and to these we owe our survival and whatever we have achieved to this day.

For the last 21 years, we have also succeeded in becoming a member of the European Union, that stands as the staunchest supporter of international law, multilateralism, and the United Nations system.

We have lived through the tragic events of invasion, uprooting, and continuing occupation. It is true that neither international law nor the United Nations protected us effectively against Turkish designs and aggression. Nor has the UN Secretary-General’s Good Offices Mission to this day succeeded in leading to a solution of the Cyprus problem. But is it not the height of naïveté, irresponsibility, and deception to blame the International Organization?

Is it not oxymoronic, paradoxical, even absurd, that we, victims more than anyone else, should now be the ones defending the law of the strong? That very law was immortalized by Thucydides in the Melian Dialogue during the Peloponnesian War, when the Athenians declared that “the strong do what their power allows, while the weak suffer what they must.”

Thucydides himself did not pass judgment; he merely recorded the brutal logic of power politics. And indeed, history has confirmed time and again that great powers act according to their interests, rarely swayed by appeals to justice or fairness. But even then, and even more so today, it is clear that moral decay and intoxication with power lead only to corruption, deviation, and eventual downfall.

Justice is never found on such terms. Nor is it true, as some would like us to believe, that when the world advances “with fire and with sword,” to borrow the words of composer Manos Hadjidakis and poet Nicos Gatsos in Kemal, civilization and humanity prevail. However much certain partialities have been linked with the need to confront asymmetric threats, particularly terrorism, or with legitimate defense, or with other situations partially covered by international law, the use of force and coercion cannot disregard proportionality and the necessity of protecting human life and respecting civilians, who cannot be considered fated collateral damage without further thought.

The brutal and barbaric Hamas attack of October 7, with its tragic losses, does not constitute an alibi and does not legitimize Israel’s ongoing genocidal practices in Gaza. In any case, whether in Ukraine, in Gaza, in Sudan, or here, it is not international law or the UN that is exposed, but the callousness of power and its handmaidens. It is not that “the shore is crooked”, it is that we sail wrongly.

It is our responsibility to ensure that the 21st century is the century of the rule of law, of the protection of the sanctity of human existence, of human rights, and of the values and principles of civilized humanity.

*Andreas Mavroyiannis, Ambassador ad hon. Member of the UN International Law Commission.

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