The UNSG’s Special Representative in Cyprus, Colin Stewart, will have separate meetings with Cyprus President, Nicos Anastasiades, and Turkish Cypriot leader, Ersin Tatar, ahead of his trip to New York where the UN Security Council is expected to vote in late July a resolution for the renewal of the UN peacekeeping force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) mandate.
Stewart will meet with Anastasiades at the Presidential Palace on Monday morning and in the afternoon he will meet with Tatar at his office, in the Turkish-occupied areas of the island, CNA has learned.
The meetings will be taking place in the shadow of a replying letter which Tatar sent to Anastasiades on June 20, 2022, in which he claimed that it is essential for the “sovereign equality” and “equal international status” of the Turkish Cypriots to be secured as this “will open the door for meaningful and formal negotiations, which will aim at establishing a structured cooperative relationship between the two equal states.”
Invited by CNA to comment on Tatar’s letter, Government Spokesman, Marios Pelekanos, has said that once again the other side reiterates its unacceptable demand for the recognition of equal sovereign rights for the illegal regime, “something which of course serves their goal to reach a two state solution, something which we will not accept in any case.”
“We will expect the proposals which Tatar says he intends to submit, while we make clear that in order for them to be the basis for discussion they must abide by the provisions of the UN Security Council resolutions, the international law and the EU principles and values,” the Spokesman concluded.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkey invaded and occupied its northern third. Repeated rounds of UN-led peace talks have so far failed to yield results.
Source: Cyprus News Agency