Turkish Cypriot Leader Ersin Tatar on Tuesday said it is not his fault if people “cannot see the realities of Cyprus”.

Speaking during a trip to the German capital Berlin, he made reference to the country’s President Frank-Walter Steinmeier’s visit to Cyprus last month, saying “we leave his like alone with their own conscience.

“If they cannot see the realities of Cyprus, if they still cannot understand, it is probably not our fault, it is their fault,” he said.

He then touched on Cyprus’ history, explaining that Turkish Cypriots were “equal founding partners” of the Republic of Cyprus in 1960 and that as a result, “the Turkish Cypriots have a right to sovereignty just as much as the Greek Cypriots.

“They have the right to establish a state [in Cyprus], since the original state was destroyed by force of arms when they expelled the Turks from government,” he said.

He added that Cyprus is “60 kilometres from Turkey, 1,000km from Greece, and 2,000km from the centre of the European Union. Therefore, no one can break the bond between Cyprus and Turkey.

“The game they are playing is for Cyprus to enter the EU under a federal solution and to gradually sever its connection with Turkey as Turkey is not an EU member state,” he said.

He added that he will “never allow” this to happen, saying “the realities of Cyprus have been revealed in such a way that we have to keep our own state alive in Cyprus. If we give up on the TRNC, that is the day we are finished.”