Cyprus solution key to ending FIR safety issues

The ultimate solution to longstanding flight safety problems affecting the Nicosia FIR (flight information region) lies in resolving the Cyprus problem, acting director of Civil Aviation Haris Antoniades told the Cyprus Mail, saying Turkey remains the only neighbouring country with which Cyprus cannot communicate on air traffic control. “The solution is a solution to the Cyprus problem,” Antoniades said when asked what could ultimately resolve the situation. What should exist, he explained, is something considerably more ordinary than Cyprus’ political reality currently allows: two neighbouring states whose air traffic control authorities communicate with each other. “The solution is for us and Turkey to be two neighbouring states which cooperate in air traffic control, as all neighbouring states around the world do,” he said. Cyprus already does this with Greece, Israel, Lebanon and Egypt, while communication with Syria has also resumed following the crisis there. “And with Turkey,” he said, “this should be no different.” Antoniades was speaking a day after a joint meeting of the House defence and transport committees examined risks to flight safety in the Nicosia FIR arising from Turkish actions and activities linked to the breakaway administration in the north. Defence Minister Vasilis Palmas and Transport Minister Eva Tsolaki also attended Thursday’s meeting, where concerns over staffing and the need to upgrade systems at the air traffic control centre were discussed, alongside proposals to create a state air navigation company. For Antoniades, however, understanding the problem first requires an understanding of what the Nicosia FIR is and, crucially, the distinction between an FIR and Cyprus’ national airspace. “When the FIRs were divided in 1951 by the International Civil Aviation Organisation, ICAO, countries which had been with the Allied powers were given large FIRs,” he said, pointing to Cyprus and Malta as examples. By contrast, he said, countries which had been aligned with the Axis powers, or associated with that side during the war, were allocated considerably smaller areas relative to their territory. He cited Turkey as one example, saying its FIR is relatively small compared with the geographical size of the country. This, Antoniades said, helps explain why the Nicosia FIR is so extensive compared with Cyprus itself, stretching from the area between Kastellorizo and Antalya eastwards towards Syria and south towards Lebanon and Israel. He stressed, however, that the historical circumstances in which the FIR boundaries emerged do not alter their status today. “There is no issue over that,” he said, making clear that the boundaries themselves are not currently in dispute. “When we talk about national airspace, there are different types of airspace,” Antoniades explained. Cyprus exercises sovereignty over the airspace above its territory and territorial waters. Beyond that, it is responsible for providing air traffic services within the wider Nicosia FIR. The distinction is also important when describing Turkish activity. A “violation”, Antoniades said, concerns national airspace. In international airspace within the Nicosia FIR, the issue is instead one of breaches of air traffic control rules. Turkey, he said, is responsible for both. “Turkey violates our national airspace when it lands aircraft at Tymbou (Ercan) airport, whether military aircraft or any other aircraft,” Antoniades said. Breaches within the FIR occur, he said, when aircraft do not comply with the air traffic control rules and procedures administered by the Republic. But the absence of communication between air traffic control at Tymbou and the Republic appears to be the most serious problem. “We do not communicate. That is the problem,” Antoniades said. He was equally adamant, however, that the issue should not be portrayed as a disagreement between two communities unable to establish a technical arrangement. “We should not downgrade the whole issue or present it as a bicommunal dispute, because it is not that,” he said. The Republic of Cyprus is the internationally recognised state responsible for providing air traffic services within the Nicosia FIR, he said, while Cyprus’ airspace also forms part of European airspace. “I cannot go and speak with the occupying power in a way that gives me official status on one side and gives some other side corresponding status on the other,” Antoniades said. The state with which Cyprus should be communicating, he said, is Turkey. Cyprus recognises Turkey as an ICAO member state, irrespective of the fact that Ankara does not recognise the Republic of Cyprus. “The longstanding problem we have is the lack of communication between the two control centres, Ankara and Nicosia,” Antoniades said. That lack of communication, combined with Turkish activities within the Nicosia FIR, creates flight safety issues which Cyprus must continuously manage, he added. “There are, in many cases, safety issues, but we consider them manageable and we introduce measures so that incidents do not occur and risk is reduced.” Asked whether other states could act as intermediaries, Antoniades said this did not happen between Cyprus and Turkey for air traffic control purposes. He stressed, however, that if the Civil Aviation Department believed the risks could no longer be safely managed, it would take action. “We are the first who would take measures, whether these are the closure of the FIR, a reduction in traffic or anything else, in order to maintain additional levels of safety,” he said. Thursday’s discussion also brought the technical and politically sensitive nature of the risks into sharper focus. Antoniades said one of the most important outcomes he wanted from the meeting was for MPs to understand precisely what the problems were, rather than allow highly specialised aviation matters to become caught up in political rhetoric. “These issues are technical and very complex,” he said. “They are not suitable for populism or front pages.” It was for this reason, he said, that Civil Aviation had pushed for the parliamentary discussion to take place behind closed doors. “Any serious technical issue which may affect our international position, or which may be exploited and create problems, must be handled with seriousness and restraint,” Antoniades said.