Cyprus Faces Greatest Iran War Risk in EU Due to British Bases and Proximity to Conflict Zones

Cyprus faces greater risk from the Iran war than any other European Union member state due to its geographic proximity to conflict zones and the presence of British military bases on the island that have already been targeted by Iranian retaliatory strikes.

The war that spread out from the US and Israel’s strikes on Iran felt a whole lot closer to Cyprus than to any other EU state. Travelling to Cyprus earlier this year highlighted just how far away the small Mediterranean island actually is from the rest of the bloc, with the distance between Cyprus and Turkey to the north and then Syria to the east, roughly equivalent to the gap between Dublin and Holyhead.

The Republic of Cyprus government was right to be worried about the US decision to move against Tehran. An Iranian-made drone hit a UK airbase on Cyprus, believed to have been launched from Lebanon, and several other incoming drones had to be shot down in the early days of the war.

In the view of Iran and its proxy, Hizbullah, the presence of two sovereign British RAF bases on the island – there under the terms of a 1960 independence deal ending British rule – made Cyprus a legitimate target in the retaliatory attacks that also saw Iran launch a barrage of missiles at US-aligned Gulf states.

The drone attack, and the Trump administration’s threats about seizing Greenland, renewed a debate about the EU’s mutual assistance clause, which binds everybody else to aid a member state under attack. A product of the Lisbon Treaty, the clause says an EU state subjected to an “armed aggression on its territory” can request help from the rest of the union, and obliges the others to send “aid and assistance by all the means in their power.”

An F-35 jet is seen at RAF Akrotiri in Akrotiri, Cyprus. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty

Context and Analysis

The drone strike on the British air base in Akrotiri brings Europe’s proximity to the conflict in Iran into sharp relief. In the fog of war, old tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean risk being reignited, and regional stakeholders must avoid escalation.