The Cyprus question has returned to the forefront of international diplomacy. As consultations continue under the auspices of the United Nations Secretary-General’s Personal Envoy, María Ángela Holguín, international media outlets have begun reporting on possible new settlement formulas. A recent report in The Independent claimed that Holguín was exploring a more flexible framework that both sides could accept without requiring either to abandon its long-held political narrative entirely. According to the report, the proposed model would significantly limit the powers of the federal government, grant extensive autonomy to the constituent states, establish new mechanisms guaranteeing political equality and rely on what diplomats often describe as “constructive ambiguity,” allowing each side to describe the same institutional arrangement in different political terms.

The report naturally attracted considerable attention. For the first time in years, it appeared to suggest that a new area of common ground might be emerging between the parties. It was not long, however, before both United Nations officials and the Greek Cypriot administration clarified that no formal proposal had been presented to the sides. Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhürman likewise stated that no binding document existed and that discussions remained at the level of exploratory ideas. That is, after all, how diplomacy often functions. Before official texts appear, ideas are circulated, reactions are tested, possible areas of compromise are explored and public opinion is gradually prepared for negotiations that may eventually follow.

The real question today, however, is not whether Holguín has drafted a new settlement plan. The more fundamental question is why more than sixty years of constitutional models, United Nations initiatives, international conferences and comprehensive peace plans have repeatedly failed to produce a lasting settlement. Unless that question is answered honestly, there is little reason to believe that any new formula, however innovative it may appear, will enjoy a more successful fate than its predecessors.

The problem is not simply the constitution, but the collapse of the balance

In my view, the greatest mistake made over the past several decades has been to treat Cyprus primarily as a constitutional problem. Whether the island should be reunited through a federation, a looser federation or a more confederal arrangement; how many powers the central government should exercise; or how a rotating presidency should function are all important questions. Yet none of them, by themselves, can produce a sustainable settlement. Constitutions may establish states, but what enables states to survive is the political legitimacy and strategic balance upon which those constitutions rest.

The Republic of Cyprus established in 1960 was never intended to be based on a constitution alone. The architects of the London and Zurich Agreements were designing not merely a partnership between two communities but a broader security architecture for the Eastern Mediterranean. Accordingly, the 1960 settlement rested upon four mutually reinforcing pillars: the Treaty of Establishment, the Treaty of Guarantee, the Treaty of Alliance and the Constitution itself.

At the heart of that architecture stood two interconnected balances.

The first was the internal balance. Political equality between the island’s two constituent peoples, shared sovereignty, mutual veto powers, joint participation in public administration and reciprocal security guarantees together formed the foundation of that internal equilibrium. The guiding principle was straightforward: neither community would be able to dominate the other or exercise exclusive sovereignty over the state.

The second was the external balance. The system of guarantees provided by Türkiye, Greece and the United Kingdom was never intended merely to provide military security. Rather, it represented the Cypriot extension of a broader Western security architecture that had begun taking shape when Türkiye and Greece joined NATO together in 1952. While the internal balance protected the partnership between the two constituent peoples, the external balance created the international security framework within which that partnership could survive regional power competition. The logic underpinning the entire system was unmistakable: the internal and external balances complemented one another, and if one collapsed, the other was unlikely to endure for long.

That is precisely what occurred. By the end of 1963, the effective breakdown of the partnership republic and the exclusion of Turkish Cypriots from the institutions of the state destroyed not only the constitutional order but also the internal balance upon which it rested. Nevertheless, the international community continued to recognise the Greek Cypriot administration alone as the Republic of Cyprus. A de facto situation gradually acquired de jure legitimacy, allowing the international system to continue operating on the assumption that the original partnership state still existed, even though one of its constituent partners had been effectively removed from it.

2004: The collapse of the external balance

Contemporary discussions of Cyprus frequently focus on 1974 as the decisive turning point. Yet the strategic rupture that continues to shape today’s negotiating environment occurred in 2004. That year witnessed not only the referendum on the Annan Plan but also the effective collapse of the external balance established in 1960.

In reality, that balance had begun to erode much earlier. The logic underpinning the London and Zurich settlement was never confined to the Treaty of Guarantee alone. It rested on the broader assumption that strategic equilibrium between Türkiye and Greece would be preserved throughout the wider Western security architecture. Their simultaneous accession to NATO formed one pillar of that understanding. Another, though never formally codified, was reflected in the military and economic assistance provided by the United States during much of the Cold War, which was widely understood to maintain an approximate seven-to-three ratio in Türkiye’s favour. The objective was not to privilege one ally over the other but to preserve a strategic equilibrium in which neither could establish decisive superiority over its NATO partner.

The first major blow to that architecture came when Greece joined the European Community while Türkiye remained outside the European integration process. Athens thereby acquired influence not only within NATO but also inside Europe’s political institutions, while Ankara possessed no equivalent institutional leverage. The decisive transformation, however, came in 2004.

Although Turkish Cypriots voted in favour of the Annan Plan and Greek Cypriots rejected it, the Greek Cypriot administration was nevertheless admitted into the European Union as a full member. This created a situation that contradicted not merely the political spirit but also the institutional logic of the 1960 settlement. Under the original partnership arrangements, no constituent partner possessed the unilateral authority to alter the international status of the Republic of Cyprus or make a strategic decision of such profound significance on behalf of the entire state. Yet despite the effective collapse of the partnership republic, the Greek Cypriot administration entered the European Union as the internationally recognised representative of the whole island.

From that point onward, the Greek Cypriot administration ceased to be merely the internationally recognised government of Cyprus. It became a full member state of the European Union, exercising all the institutional rights and privileges that status entails. It acquired voting rights within the European Council, obtained the capacity to influence Türkiye’s accession process, gained the ability to block the modernisation of the Customs Union and visa liberalisation initiatives, and secured institutional mechanisms capable of vetoing decisions relating to European security and defence policy.

Türkiye, meanwhile, remained the principal guarantor under the Treaty of Guarantee and a central pillar of the Eastern Mediterranean security architecture, yet found itself entirely excluded from the European Union’s institutional decision-making mechanisms. As a result, the external balance so carefully constructed in 1960 was fundamentally reshaped – not through any formal revision of international law, but through the practical consequences of European Union enlargement.

Today, this remains perhaps the most overlooked reality in the negotiations. The international community continues to concentrate on reconstructing the internal balance between the island’s two communities while paying insufficient attention to the profound transformation of the external balance over the past two decades. Constitutional models, distributions of powers, presidential councils and institutional formulas continue to dominate the discussion, yet none of them addresses the strategic asymmetry created by European Union membership.

A durable settlement therefore requires more than reconstructing the constitutional order; it also requires rebuilding the external balance. That does not necessarily mean Türkiye must become a member of the European Union. It does mean, however, that within the specific context of Cyprus, Türkiye will need to enjoy functional rights and institutional mechanisms capable of offsetting the strategic advantages Greece derives from its European Union membership. Otherwise, the balance that the architects of 1960 sought to establish will remain incomplete, leaving the new constitutional order vulnerable to the same structural weaknesses that undermined its predecessor.

Likewise, any comprehensive settlement will require an innovative legal framework governing the island’s ports and airports that moves beyond traditional concepts of sovereignty. Those entry points would simultaneously serve as the international gateways of a reunited Cyprus and as part of the European Union’s external frontier. In that respect, the hybrid customs and border arrangements developed between the United Kingdom and the European Union following Brexit – particularly the functional mechanisms established under the Windsor Framework – offer valuable precedents worthy of careful examination. Such an approach could reconcile the European Union’s external border regime with Türkiye’s legitimate security concerns arising from its guarantor responsibilities while ensuring the uninterrupted movement of people, goods and commerce across the island.

In short, the Cyprus question is no longer merely a constitutional dispute between two communities. It has become one of the unresolved consequences of the strategic imbalance that has emerged between Europe’s security architecture and the institutional evolution of the European Union over the past two decades. Any durable settlement must therefore involve not only the drafting of a new constitutional framework but also the construction of a new external balance adapted to today’s geopolitical realities.

Europe’s strategic miscalculation

This broader reality also became evident during the NATO Summit in Ankara. One of the most significant, though largely overlooked, discussions took place during President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s meeting with European Council President António Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Once again, Cyprus emerged as the principal point of divergence between Türkiye and the European Union.

The European Union maintained the position it has pursued for many years. Progress in relations with Türkiye, European leaders argued, would become possible if meaningful progress were first achieved on Cyprus. The modernisation of the Customs Union, visa facilitation, closer defence-industrial cooperation and the revitalisation of political dialogue were all once again linked to developments in the Cyprus negotiations.

At first glance, this approach may appear perfectly reasonable. The European Union presents these instruments as incentives designed to encourage compromise. In reality, however, it is treating the very conditions that could make a settlement possible as rewards to be granted only after a settlement has already been achieved.

That logic is fundamentally flawed.

Trust is not a prize to be distributed at the conclusion of successful negotiations. It is the prerequisite that allows meaningful negotiations to begin in the first place.

Expecting the parties to make far-reaching political compromises on Cyprus before strategic confidence has been rebuilt between Türkiye and the European Union, and before cooperation in the fields of security, defence and economic integration has been placed on a stable institutional footing, is simply unrealistic.

This has long been the central argument I have sought to advance. The European Union insists that Cyprus must first be resolved before relations with Türkiye can improve. Yet the logic of a sustainable settlement points in precisely the opposite direction. Strategic confidence between Türkiye and Europe must first be restored. Türkiye’s place within Europe’s evolving security architecture should be firmly anchored, and its indispensable role in the Eastern Mediterranean and in the future of European defence should be institutionalised. Once such a political environment exists, the two sides in Cyprus will negotiate within a far stronger atmosphere of confidence and considerably greater strategic certainty.

Europe’s geopolitical environment has changed beyond recognition. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the gradual reorientation of American strategic priorities towards the Indo-Pacific, growing instability across the Middle East and Europe’s urgent need to rebuild its defence industrial base have made Türkiye more strategically important than at any point in recent decades. Yet despite this transformation, the European Union continues to treat the Cyprus question as a precondition for improving relations with Ankara. Increasingly, this amounts to confusing the conditions necessary for achieving a settlement with the rewards that should follow one. It is an approach whose limitations are becoming ever more apparent.

The starting point for a settlement

The success or failure of Holguín’s current initiative will ultimately be determined by this very question. If the new process becomes another exercise in constitutional engineering, concentrating primarily on the powers of the central government, the competences of the constituent states or the mechanics of institutional design, the mistakes of previous negotiations are likely to be repeated. If, however, the negotiations are conducted within a broader framework that also recognises the island’s transformed geopolitical environment and the profound changes that have taken place in the regional balance of power over the past six decades, a genuinely sustainable settlement may, for the first time, become attainable.

Tufan Erhürman’s approach since taking office is particularly noteworthy in this regard. Rather than advocating an abrupt return from the two-state discourse to the classical federal model, he has placed emphasis on a different set of principles: political equality, effective participation, result-oriented and time-bound negotiations, the preservation of the convergences achieved in previous rounds of talks, and the principle that, should negotiations fail once again, there can be no return to the pre-existing status quo. In doing so, he has shifted the focus away from constitutional labels towards a negotiating methodology and a sustainable political framework capable of commanding the confidence of both sides. Holguín’s own public statements similarly suggest an approach aimed less at imposing a predetermined constitutional model than at developing creative methods capable of expanding areas of common interest.

Whatever constitutional formula may eventually emerge, one fundamental reality will remain unchanged. Lasting peace cannot be built upon legal texts alone. No constitutional order can endure indefinitely if one side believes itself to be placed at a permanent structural disadvantage. Durable peace rests not primarily upon legal formulas but upon political balances that all parties recognise as fundamentally fair.

The question that should therefore dominate today’s debate is not whether Cyprus should become a federation, a confederation or some looser constitutional arrangement. The real question is whether sufficient political will exists to reconstruct, under contemporary geopolitical conditions, the internal and external balance that has gradually disintegrated since 1960.

The history of Cyprus over the past six decades offers a powerful lesson. The Republic established in 1960 did not fail because its constitutional provisions were inherently defective. It failed because the balance upon which those constitutional arrangements rested collapsed. Any future partnership on the island must therefore begin by addressing that fundamental reality. The internal balance must guarantee genuine political equality and effective participation for both constituent peoples. The external balance must be redesigned to reflect the transformed geopolitical realities of Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean.

Perhaps it is finally time to begin asking different questions about Cyprus. For decades we have debated the same constitutional models, revisited the same institutional formulas and encountered the same disappointments. Perhaps the problem has never been our answers but the questions we have chosen to ask. Before debating how a federation should be constructed, we should first ask how the balance necessary to sustain it can be restored. States may indeed be born through constitutional documents, but they survive only within a political order founded upon trust, legitimacy and an equitable distribution of power.

Cyprus will prove no exception.

If the European Union, Türkiye, Greece, the United Kingdom and the island’s two constituent peoples are genuinely committed to achieving a lasting settlement, they must first acknowledge honestly how profoundly the internal and external balance established in 1960 has been transformed. Only then can any future settlement – whether it is described as a federation, a confederation or by some entirely different constitutional formula – have a realistic prospect of enduring. Otherwise, diplomacy will continue producing new initiatives, expectations will once again rise, and Cyprus will remain trapped in the same cycle that has frustrated every previous generation.

The path to a durable settlement begins not with drafting another constitution, but with restoring the balance that alone can sustain it.

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