United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday said he will do “everything I can to support” Cypriots in their path towards a solution to the Cyprus problem, after he met President Nikos Christodoulides.
“This visit is a visit of solidarity to the people of cyprus and to show my strong commitment to make sure that we are able to have, finally, the solution in Cyprus,” he said.
He added that the pursuit of a solution “depends, obviously, on the Cypriots themselves”, and said that the island’s three guarantor powers “also have a role to play”, but stressed that “I will do everything I can to support Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots in this important moment”.
The meeting comes amid a “new initiative” being taken with the aim of bringing about a resumption of negotiations in earnest to solve the Cyprus problem.
It is hoped that this “new initiative” will culminate in an enlarged meeting on the Cyprus problem being convened later in the summer, with that meeting set to involve the island’s two sides, its three guarantor powers, Greece, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, and the UN.
Guterres will meet Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman later in the morning.
In preparation for his arrival to Cyprus, Guterres had held a telephone conversation with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Sunday, while Christodoulides had himself prepared for Guterres’ visit by visiting Athens and meeting Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
Mitsotakis had said of Guterres’ arrival that that with the secretary-general set to leave office at the end of this year, a sense of urgency has been created.
“Now is the time to explore the possibility of turning this into reality,” he told Christodoulides.
On Friday, Fidan had met Holguin in Ankara, with Holguin having arrived directly from Brussels, where she had met both European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the commission’s envoy for the Cyprus problem Raffaele Fitto in separate meetings.
Von der Leyen had said after her meeting with Holguin that “I welcome her active engagement, alongside [Guterres], to resolve the Cyprus issue within the UN framework and in line with European Union principles, values, and legislation”.
Last week, Tufan Erhurman had said that the Turkish Cypriots “have been willing to solve [the Cyprus problem] for many years”, pointing to their vote in favour of the 2004 Annan plan to reunify Cyprus and its support for the most recent round of negotiations in earnest, held at the Swiss ski resort of Crans-Montana in 2017, as examples.
He also referred to Guterres’ insistence that “this time it must be different”, saying that “we do not want negotiations for the sake of negotiations, or a five-plus-one meeting for the sake of a five-plus-one meeting”, before stressing that “we want to be result-oriented”.
Earlier this week, Christodoulides had said that the outcome of the hoped-for enlarged meeting must entail “the resumption of talks”.
Prior to this week, Turkey, too, had appeared to be open to the idea of a return to negotiations in earnest, with Fidan, the EU’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos, and Internal Affairs Commissioner Magnus Brunner, signing a joint declaration offering his support for Guterres’ efforts in Cyprus last month.
Additionally, both von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa had called on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to “seize the renewed momentum” to bring about a solution to the Cyprus problem, when the trio met on the sidelines of the Nato leaders’ summit in Ankara earlier this month.
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