On the 11 February 2019, Professor Ahmet Sözen from Eastern Mediterranean University (EMU) hosted a guest lecture entitled 'The Cyprus Conflict: The Role of Third Parties'.
Cyprus is a small island in the heart of the Mediterranean that has been the theater of an ongoing conflict since the 1960s, and consequently witnessed the physical division of the territory between the two biggest communities: the Greek-Cypriots in the South, and the Turkish-Cypriots in the North. To describe the current situation, the lecture examined the following macro themes:
- A brief historical and political introduction, with the explanation of the main reasons behind the island’s division;
- The question of the three guarantors of power (Turkey, Greece, and the United Kingdom) according to the constitution of 1960;
- Proposed solutions: creation of a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation versus reunification of the island;
- The role of external actors in the conflict: accession of the Republic of Cyprus to the EU, and the search for hydrocarbons.
Professor Ahmet Sözen
Professor Ahmet Sözen is an expert in peacebuilding and democratization processes, with direct experience on the field thanks to his participation in the peace negotiations in Cyprus. Sözen received his BA degree in 1991 in English Language Education from Bogazici/Bosphorus University (Istanbul, Turkey), his MA in International Relation in 1993 from Syracuse University (USA) and his Ph.D. in Political Science (International Relations) in 1999 from University of Missouri (USA). He is currently a professor of International Relations at Eastern Mediterranean University (EMU), in Famagusta.
