Nicosia: Government Spokesperson Konstantinos Letymbiotis expressed hope that the meeting the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres will have with Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman on February 11 will be a step towards the resumption of the Cyprus peace talks. The meeting was announced Sunday by the ''presidency'' in the occupied areas.
According to Cyprus News Agency, this will be the first contact Guterres will have with Erhurman since he became leader of the Turkish Cypriot community, about four months ago. Letymbiotis emphasized that any contact with the United Nations, especially at the Secretary-General's level, is positive and potentially constructive.
Letymbiotis further stated that systematic efforts are being made to create conditions for the resumption of the peace dialogue. "We hope that the meeting will be a step towards the resumption of the negotiations," he noted. The Spokesperson expressed the desire for the meeting to pave the way for the continuation of talks, as intended by the Secretary-General, within the previously agreed framework.
He reiterated that the Greek Cypriot side is prepared to resume talks from where they left off, a stance that has been consistently expressed by President Nikos Christodoulides. Letymbiotis highlighted the importance of convening an expanded meeting under the auspices of the UN Secretary-General to achieve substantial progress.
Cyprus has been divided since the 1974 illegal Turkish invasion, and repeated UN-backed talks to reunite the island under a federal roof have not yet yielded results.