The Cyprus Problem in Australia

Abstract

The Cyprus issue occupies a visible position within Australian politics which ‘under normal circumstances would have been treated as marginal’. Nowhere is this more prevalent than in the federal parliament, which has accumulated approximately 274 entries in the parliamentary debates of both the House of Representatives and the Senate. This article provides both a normative and deductive account of this phenomenon by first establishing a conceptual framework of Australia’s connection with the Cyprus problem. It will be pointed out that the formation of an Australian policy on Cyprus rests on the capacity of the Greek-Australian community to act as an interest group within a pluralist political environment. However, it would be argued that in comparison to other countries which maintain a sizeable Greek community, the subsequent relevance of an issue such as Cyprus to Australia’s immediate national interest and sphere of influence restricts any substantive role that Australia can undertake in the conflict. Within such a prism, the paper will also examine how and to what extent the Cyprus issue in Australia has been determined by the triadic relationship between the Greek-Australian community (diaspora), the host-country (Australia) and the home-country (Greece and Cyprus).