PSU Magazine Fall 2005

from living in a war zone to being j usL anoLher junior al Santa Cruz High. "lL was a long time before I could even wriLe a semence about Cyprus," he says. Yesilada stayed in the U.S. for his higher education, eventually becoming an expert in Turkey and the European Union (EU). The U.S. Slate Depart– ment has called on him numerous times since 1990 to brief diplomats on sensitive issues before Lhey head off to Cyprus. "! don'L look at Cyprus as a Turkish Cypriot anymore. 1 can look at iL from outside," he says. "The problem wiLh people trying Lo achieve peace in Cyprus is they are trying to do it within the box." A nastasiou, a college pr fessor in Cyprus, met Yesilada in a workshop in the buffer zone in the late '90s. Then in 2002 Anastasiou was invited Lo give a lecture at PSU. "When l got here l was told there was another Cypriot. Then when I saw Biro!, we smiled because we realized we had worked together. " Anastasiou soon joined the PSU faculty to lead the PIP in cooperation with Yesilada as part of the Graduate Program in Conflict Resolution. ln addition to being able to take a full menu of graduate-level courses through the program, students can actually go Lo Cyprus to get a front– row view of what they're studying. In a remarkable two-week trip to Cyprus that Anastasiou led in March, 24 Portland State students met and talked with leading peace builders on both sides, spoke with members of parliament, and had an audience with the both the U.S. ambassador and a former president of Cyprus. They vis– ited both sides or the island, walking along the buffer zone with a Greek Cypriot guide one day and a Turkish Cypriot guide the next. They visited both Greek and Turkish refugees. "One of the realizations for the stu– dents was that once a war is over and it's not on TV anymore, the effects of the war go on. It gave them a sense of the profundity of what war really is, as well as what it takes to move the peace process forward," Anastasiou says. PIP was also a catalyst for the for– mation of the Portland Greekffurkish Association at PSU. One of its found– ing members, grad student Dimiuis Desyllas '01, traveled LO Cyprus last year and discovered just how strange it is to live day-to-day in a divided coun– try where the EU only recognizes one side (the Greek) and neither side recognizes the other. "When we crossed for the first time to the north (Turkish) side of the island we wanted to call some people on that side. We found out we had to call them through Turkey, so it was an international phone call-even though we had a cellular phone with a Greek Cypriot phone number and we had just walked 100 meters from the Greek Cypriot pan," Dcsyllas wrote in the Daily Vanguard. Desyllas and his group solved the problem by getting a Turkish Cypriot phone chip and switching it with the phone'.s Greek chip whenever they were in the north part of the island, then swapping it again when they trav– eled south. It's small, eye-opening experiences such as these that underscore the absurdity or the conflict. But simply listing grievances can only go so far in finding soluLions, AnasLasiou says. The goal of PIP and the student group is to get beyond that. "There are many legitimate reasons to hate each other. Whal we want to do is open up a whole new level of understanding," Anastasiou says. B oth professors say they are work– ing for bigger stakes than just Cyprus. Reuniting the island could go far in improving relations between Greece and Turkey, which could ease the way for Turkey-which Yesilada calls the only stable, democraLic Muslim coun– try in the world-to gain membership in the European Union. That could, in turn, have positive implications for a larger Middle East peace. Anastasiou says the Green Line is already eroding, thanks in large part to a grassroots peace movement within the country and a growing acknowl– edgment of the pain and suffering of the past. But the ultimate goal of a final political settlement remains elu– sive. The latest bump in the road was the failure of a United Nations plan, introduced in 2002, to reunite the island. The plan's success depended on the approval of Cypriot citizens on both sides of the buffer zone through a national referendum conducted last year. Yesilada was part of the referen– dum effort, working with teams of people to convince the citizens that the plan was a good idea. "lt was the greatesl effort of my life," he says. The Cypriot Turks voted in favor or the plan. But the Greeks, distrusting the Turks and the 30,000 Turkish troops posted on the island, turned it down. Yesilada fears that the referen– dum'.s failure will reignite old resent– ments and that nationalism will resurface \.vith a vengeance. "If that happens, we're back to square one," he says. l:e survey Yesilada and Anastasiou will help conduct this fall in Cyprus will poll 500 Cypriots on both sides of the Green Line about their fears, about their attitudes toward each other, and how much they are interested in changing the status quo. At least it will give them, and the international com– munity, a benchmark that could help point to the next step. Working within Cyprus, promoting sLudent exchanges, bolstering the country'.s grassroots movement-all are essential building blocks toward an eventual peace. But both Anastasiou and Yesilada agree there is a special power in doing these things from a base outside the Mediterranean. Says Anastasiou, "The U.S. has the diplomatic clout-if it wants to use it-and the European Union has the peace enhancing institutions. They are the only ones who can actually move these rocks gently." 0 aohn Kirkland, a Portland freelance write,; wrote the articles "Business Not as Usual" and "A Fish Out of Water" in the sp1ing 2005 PSU Magazine.) FALL 2005 P U MAGAZINE 19