The Upcoming Peace Talks

[JBA]

There are a lot of stories around at the moment about Turkey and Israel co-operating on the distribution of Israel gas via a pipeline through Turkey with Turkey itself becoming a major customer. An aspect of these stories is the consequent effect on South Cyprus's ambitions.

In a nutshell, South Cyprus's plan for a LNG plant to liquefy their own gas (estimated to cost US$15billion and at least 6 years to construct) can only ever approach viablility if it also handles Israeli gas as per the memorandum signed last year. But the proposed pipline from Israel through Turkey would cost only US$2.5 billion and would be up and running 2 years after agreement was reached. If that goes ahead then South Cyprus won't sell any gas at all unless it also constructs a pipeline through Turkey or to Israel to join their pipeline - although in the latter case Turkey could refuse to allow Cyprus gas into the network.

I am no political genius but it seems to me that these facts must considerably strengthen the hand of North Cyprus in the upcoming peace? talks. I just wondered what others think.

http://www.todayszaman.com/news-339887- ... tions.html

http://www.lgcnews.com/souths-lng-proje ... precipice/

http://cyprus-mail.com/2014/02/19/lng-p ... precipice/

[waddo]

Not being political either but, Turkey is not a stupid country. Any country that would sink billions in a project with a country that is already in huge debt could not be classed as clever? The USA backs Turkey either in plain sight or by hidden means - to not do so would lose its Mediterranean aircraft carrier and that it could not afford, the USA backs Israel in similar ways and its oil/gas company's would make a fat profit out of any pipeline going via Turkey.
As for the Cyprus "Peace Talks", in the past I note that Turkey has been very loud about its stance on Cyprus, always proclaiming that it stands one foot in front of Turkish Cyprus and always will - however, of late Turkey has been very quite over the peace talks (or I have missed it) and with their elections coming up soon I think they are more concerned (well at least one person is) with who will be the next president.
From the local people I have talked to there seems to be a feeling that the Federated Cyprus, with two federations (Turkish/Greek) is the way forward. That this proposal also indicates a change from the TL to the Euro for the North is the pathway to economic disaster for the North and has apparently gone unnoticed by the vast majority.
As always, guessing is the name of the game in Cyprus and we will all just have to wait and see what happens in this and the next thirty or forty sets of peace talks.