The United Nations’ top official in Cyprus Colin Stewart told the security council of a “deep distrust” between the island’s two sides, according to reports on Tuesday.
The Cyprus News Agency reported that during Stewart’s briefing of the security council regarding the state of affairs in Cyprus on Monday night, he said this distrust is “an obstacle to any agreement”.
According to the report, Stewart “shared many personal thoughts” with security council members and said that he considers the “most important problem” to be the “different narratives” on either side of the island.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had alluded to this issue in his latest six-monthly report on the state of the UN’s peacekeeping force in Cyprus (Unficyp).
“It is deeply concerning that divisive narratives on the island are often overshadowing those of peace. I remain concerned about the harmful impact of disinformation, which continues to erode trust, polarise communities, and undermine efforts toward a shared and peaceful future,” he wrote.
As such, he urged President Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar to “make further progress on inclusivity in facilitating reconciliation and supporting intercommunal contacts”.
On a more positive note, he did add that he was “encouraged” that “youth groups continue to be active agents of peace”.
Guterres’ latest report was broadly positive, stressing that there had been “no major security crises” on the island in the last six months, and that this “has been observed over the years in which periods of greater dialogue and activity in the peace process also see a parallel restraint from unilateral actions that threaten the security situation”.
There was also positive news over the matter of buffer zone violations, too, with Guterres writing that “a decrease in the occurrence of moves forward and overmanning violations” had been recorded in the first half of the year.
He wrote that in part, “this was due to the increased senior-level military engagement between Unficyp and the sides” which “specifically targeted such violations”.
Stewart’s briefing comes ahead of this week’s enlarged meeting on the Cyprus problem, which is set to begin in New York on Wednesday.
The enlarged meeting, the second of its kind this year, is set to be attended by Christodoulides, Tatar, Guterres, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, Greek Foreign Minister Giorgos Gerapetritis, and the United Kingdom’s minister of state for Europe Stephen Doughty.
Monday’s briefing was also Stewart’s last. He is set to retire next month.
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