All members of the Organisation of Turkic States (OTS) except for Hungary will be present for a meeting of its council of elders which is set to take place in northern Cyprus on Friday, the council’s chairman and former Turkish prime minister Binali Yildirim said on Wednesday.

As such, the meeting will be attended by representatives of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkey, and Uzbekistan.

He confirmed the meeting’s participants and its date to Turkish newspaper Nefes, saying of Hungary that it is “understandable that, as a European Union country, it does not want to participate because it is concerned about the reaction of the EU and its members, Greece, and the Greek Cypriot administration”.

On this matter, he said Greece and the Republic of Cyprus have intensified their efforts to stand in the way of the north’s efforts to gain international legitimacy, with journalist Deniz Zeyrek, who interviewed Yildirim, offering his conclusions on the matter.

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“Greece and the Greek Cypriot administration seem to have stepped up a gear within the EU. They know that Turkey also wants to open a new era with the EU due to political and economic problems, and they want to turn this into an opportunity,” he wrote.

“EU countries openly support Greece and the Greek Cypriot administration. The fact that they have taken relations with the Greek Cypriot administration to the next level by providing around $12 billion of aid to the Turkic states must be a result of this,” he said, in reference to the joint declaration signed by four Turkic states which ruled out the prospect of any of them recognising the north as an independent country.

Friday’s meeting will be the council of elders’ 17th since its establishment in 2010. The council is currently chaired by former Turkish prime minister Binali Yildirim. Its last meeting took place in Budapest in November.

Its convening will also coincide with the official opening of Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar’s new official residence and the north’s new ‘parliament’ building near Ayios Dhometios, which is set to take place on Saturday.

The meeting comes after the signing of the joint declaration by Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan, as well as OTS observer Turkmenistan and non-Turkic Tajikistan, with the joint declaration saying that all five countries “reaffirmed our strong commitment” to United Nations security council resolutions 541 and 550.

Resolution 541 said the security council “deplores the declaration of the Turkish Cypriot authorities of the purported secession of part of the Republic of Cyprus” while calling on UN member states not to recognise the north.

Resolution 550 said it “reiterates the call upon all states not to recognise the purported state of the ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus’, set up by secessionist acts, and calls upon them not to facilitate or in any way assist the aforesaid secessionist entity”.

Turkish Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmus had said on Monday night that Turkey “did not expect” the declaration to be signed, and that “we were greatly disappointed”.

However, he said, “I think they will make up for this in the near future”, before adding that they had “understood the sensitivities of the issue” and that “God willing, we hope that then necessary measures will be taken”.

Opposition political party CHP leader Ozgur Ozel had said the joint declaration’s signing was evidence of a “collapse” of Turkish foreign policy, and even claimed that the status of Cyprus was a key part of a deal brokered by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and United States President Donald Trump to allow the arrest of Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu last month.