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Roundup: Greek, Turkish Cypriot leaders "committed to solving Cyprus problem": UN official

Xinhua, May 5, 2015 Adjust font size:

The leaders of the long-estranged Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities are committed to solving the Cyprus problem at last, a United Nations envoy said on Tuesday.

Espen Barth Eide, Norwegian former foreign minister who acts as a special advisor to the U.N. Secretary-General, completed a first round of talks with the community leaders and is preparing to announce a date for the resumption of long-stalled negotiations.

"These are two leaders who tell me that they are seriously dedicated and committed to solving the Cyprus problem, that they are ready to resume negotiations without delay," said Eide after meeting Cypriot president Nicos Anastasiades.

Eide met on Monday with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci, who swept to an electoral win last month on his promise to work hard for a solution reunifying Cyprus.

"I am encouraged by the climate that has been created over the last weeks ... and I think this is an opportunity that Cyprus must take," said Eide, referring to the result of the Turkish Cypriot vote.

Turkish Cypriots live in an enclave taken by Turkey in 1974, since when the island was divided into Turkish-Cypriots occupied north and Greek-Cypriots occupied south.

The negotiations to solve the Cyprus issue were suspended last October after Turkey, which does not recognize the Republic of Cyprus, despite the latter being a U.N. and an EU member, sent a seismographic ship and an escort of navy ships to explore for natural gas in an area allocated to Cyprus under the U.N. Convention of the Law of the Sea.

Akinci has said that he will not seek to negotiate on how to exploit natural gas discovered in the Cypriot offshore economic zone but will concentrate on the central issue which is the reunification of Cyprus.

Eide said that it was perhaps decades since Cyprus saw this kind of positive climate and urged the estranged communities to grasp the opportunity to end their division.

"I think that the sense which is created on both sides of Cyprus now is that this opportunity is unique .... And I think everybody knows that it is an opportunity which has to be utilized when it is there," said Eide.

He is expected to announce a day for resuming negotiations after hosting a dinner for the two leaders on Monday.

Negotiations are widely expected to restart on May 15.

Until then Mustafa Akinci will travel to Ankara on Saturday to meet Turkey's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who admonished the Turkish Cypriot leader for its talk about the kind of solution he has in mind.

Anastasiades will travel to Moscow also on Saturday to attend celebrations marking the anniversary of 70th anniversary of the end of World War Two and to talk with U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on his good services mission on Cyprus. Endit