Letymbiotis on Barcelona camp: We are doing exactly what a recognised state should

Government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis on Thursday insisted that in making efforts to ensure the cancellation of a children’s football camp which was due to be organised under licence on behalf of Spanish giant FC Barcelona in the north, “we are doing exactly what an internationally recognised state should do”. “It is with diplomacy that we are operating, and what we are doing is to clearly present the real state of affairs,” he said in response to a question on the matter from the Cyprus Mail. He also referred to an agreement reached in 2013 which foresaw that the Cyprus Turkish Football Association (CTFA), which was formed in 1955 after Turkish Cypriot teams were forbidden from playing matches at football grounds owned by the church, would join the Cyprus Football Association (CFA), thus allowing international recognition of Turkish Cypriot football. That agreement was signed in Zurich in 2013 by the chairmen of both Cypriot associations, Costas Koutsokoumnis and Hasan Sertoglu, in the presence of then Fifa chairman Sepp Blatter and then Uefa chairman Michel Platini, with Turkish Cypriot football clubs unanimously approving it in 2015. However, reports in 2016 stated that it was never implemented as negotiations to bring about the plan’s realisation stalled over a procedural disagreement. The CFA had wished that the CTFA register in the Republic of Cyprus, but the CTFA insisted that given that its existence predates the republic, its existence should have automatically been recognised. However, when documentation was requested to prove this, the CTFA did not produce any such documentation, and Koutsokoumnis said that “without it, the procedure cannot continue”. Letymbiotis had said earlier in the day that the camp had been “postponed”, despite Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman having raised the issue alongside the matter of the now cancelled music festival which was due to take place in Kyrenia, during his meeting with President Nikos Christodoulides on Wednesday. Erhurman had said on the matter of the festival last week that “Greek Cypriot diplomacy has been conducting a campaign for some time”. “The summary is this: ‘lifting or easing the isolation of the Turkish Cypriots will eliminate their desire for a solution’ and ‘introducing new confidence-building measures will make the status quo comfortable,” he said. Then, on Wednesday morning, he said that “I do not want any Turkish Cypriot or Greek Cypriot person to be deprived of the opportunities which young people in other countries have because of the Cyprus problem”. “The sadness which a Greek Cypriot young person may experience for such a reason cannot be my joy. As a human being, I cannot accept that the sadness which a Turkish Cypriot young person may experience for this reason should produce joy for any Greek Cypriot,” he said. He stressed that “the participation of young people, artists and clubs from other countries in any organisation held in our country does not mean that these countries recognise the TRNC”, before pointing out that “the participation of Greek Cypriot young people in any organisation held in Turkey does not mean that Turkey recognises the Greek Cypriot administration”. This comment comes after Turkey’s political opposition had expressed fury after a Greek Cypriot delegation of teenagers was invited to attend the International Geography Olympiad in Istanbul earlier this month. “If trust is to be built on this island, it is necessary to first ensure that young people trust each other,” Erhurman said on Wednesday, before adding that it was for this reason that he had suggested that bicommunal sports events be held. He had said in January that the Greek Cypriot side had rejected a proposal for a bicommunal children’s football match to be played. “Our proposal for a match between two under-14 football teams from northern and southern Cyprus was rejected. The reason given was that the teams from southern Cyprus are members of international federations, and that such a match would cause problems with those federations,” he said at the time. On Wednesday, he said that “cancelling a festival, attempting to prevent children from playing football, is, from my perspective, not a diplomatic victory, but is clearly a defeat for all people and humanity as a whole”.