Roundup: Estranged Cypriot community leaders to engage in intensified peace negotiations

The leaders of the estranged Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities are to meet twice a week in a bid to speed up the pace of UN- brokered negotiations for a Cyprus solution, the United Nations said on Wednesday.

"The two leaders decided to start meeting twice a week, beginning on June 17, working to resolve the remaining outstanding issues in an agreed structured manner," a joint statement issued on their behalf by the UN said.

Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci met for the first time on Wednesday after a diplomatic faux pas in Istanbul on May 23 at the World Humanitarian Summit.

Anastasiades canceled meetings with both Akinci and Espen Barth Eide, the UN Secretary-General's special adviser on Cyprus, after Ban Ki-moon received Akinci in Istanbul under circumstances that implied recognition of a breakaway state in the occupied part of the eastern Mediterranean island.

However, Anastasiades indicated Wednesday after the Istanbul slip had been forgotten.

"We had a creative meeting today ... In general we should all acknowledge that no problems must be generated by either side that would put in doubt, undermine, or in any way jeopardize the existing situation," Anastasiades said following the meeting.

He added there was hope to resolve the four-decade- long Cyprus problem by the end of 2016 provided there was the will and intensified negotiations created more convergences on outstanding issues.

"We decided to get personally involved to a greater extend and meet twice a week under a specific agenda so as to have a more intensive consultation on outstanding issues in a bid to achieve the desired convergences," said Anastasiades.

Anastasiades and Akinci began talks in May 2015 and have achieved a large measure of agreement. However, they still have not touched upon issues that would involve Turkey, which occupied part of Cyprus in 1974 in reaction to a coup by the military rulers of Greece at the time.

These include withdrawing an estimated 45,000 Turkish soldiers and rescinding guarantee rights dated since Cyprus' independence in 1960.

Akinci said that as of June 17 the two leaders would start discussing the powers of a central federal state and those of the "two constituent states".

"We don't seek a confederation but there will be neither a unitary state, because no such a state will be set up in Cyprus. It will be a united, unified state, a federal Cyprus," said Akinci in reference to claims by Greek opposition politicians that he is seeking a two-state solution.

The leader of the governing DISY party, Averof Neophytou, told state radio in a late night interview on Tuesday that the two leaders had until March 2017 at the latest to conclude an agreement.

He said after that he expected a protracted campaign to start for the presidential elections in February 2018, making the effort for a solution very difficult. Endit