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UN chief says Cyprus deal within reach

Xinhua, January 13, 2017 Adjust font size:

The United Nations Secretary General said Thursday an agreement on the creation of a unified Cyprus was "very close," though negotiations needed to continue to bridge persisting gaps between Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders.

"We are coming very close to what the settlement is in relation to the creation of a bi-zonal, bi-community, federal institution to the Republic of Cyprus," Antonio Guterres told press here.

"To implement it, we need to find a number of instruments...with the common objective that those instruments satisfy the security concerns of the Turkish and Greek Cypriot communities," he added.

An international conference on Cyprus kicked off on Thursday following three days of negotiations between Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci at Geneva's UN headquarters.

Involving the foreign ministers of the three guarantor powers (Turkey, Greece and Britain), the conference is seen as an historic opportunity to broker a deal which could end decades of division.

"We are at the starting point, this is the first time the five parties have discussed security and guarantees," the Secretary General highlighted.

"It is my hope that there will be a breakthrough, and I think that is what the people of Cyprus deserve and what the world needs today," he added.

If a deal were to be reached, it would subsequently be put to a public vote to both sides of the ethnically-divided island.

No indication as to when talks are expected to come to a close was given, though Guterres said his goal was to enable rival parties to come to a concrete solution that they are comfortable with.

Cyprus has been divided in two since 1974 after Turkish troops occupied the northern part of the small Mediterranean island in reaction to a coup by the military rulers of Greece at the time.

While the southern Greek Cypriot side is recognized by the international community and is a member of the European Union (EU), only Ankara officially recognizes the break-away northern region. Endit