Rival Cypriot leaders met yesterday for the formal launch of intensive UN-backed negotiations to reunify the divided Mediterranean island after three decades of failed diplomacy.
Both seen as pro-settlement moderates, President Demetris Christofias, a Greek Cypriot, and Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat, have met five times this year in a renewed push for unity.
“Today is an historic day for Cyprus,” said UN chief Ban Ki-moon’s special envoy, former Australian foreign minister Alexander Downer, who was at the launch of the talks in the UN-patrolled buffer zone of Nicosia.
PHOTO: AP
Downer said “significant progress” had been made to build confidence and create a solid foundation for the negotiations, which mark the first major push for peace on the island since a failed UN peace plan in 2004.
“There have been difficult moments over the past months and there will likely be further difficulties and challenges ahead. At the same time, the Cyprus problem is not insurmountable and the negotiations which begin today can and must have a successful outcome,” he said.
The negotiation process has an open-ended timeline but the UN has warned that the talks can not go on indefinitely without tangible progress.
The buildup to the talks has been clouded by the refusal of Turkish Cypriot authorities to allow Greek Cypriot pilgrims to travel via a town in the northwest of the island to attend a church service.
However, hundreds of Turkish- and Greek-Cypriot peace activists rallied on Monday night in the capital’s buffer zone chanting for a reunified Cyprus.
Talat, meanwhile, has raised the possibility of a settlement by the end of this year.
“It depends on the Greek-Cypriot side, if they have the will I am sure we can find a solution by the end of the year,” he said on Monday.
He insisted that any deal would have to provide for two politically equal “constituent states,” a concept which has been anathema to the Greek-Cypriot community which makes up more than 80 percent of the island’s population.
Preparatory talks at committee level since March have been accompanied by confidence-building measures, notably the opening of a crossing in Ledra Street linking south and north in the symbolic heart of old Nicosia.
It is the first intensive push for peace since a UN reunification plan was approved by Turkish Cypriots but overwhelmingly rejected by Greek Cypriots, just a week before the island joined the EU in 2004.
Optimists are pinning their hopes on the personal chemistry and shared left-wing politics of the two leaders.
Christofias was elected in February on a platform of relaunching peace efforts. Talat led the Turkish Cypriot “yes” vote in 2004.
Any agreement the leaders reach will then have to be sold to the two communities in simultaneous referendums.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when tens of thousands of Turkish troops occupied its northern third in response to an Athens-engineered Greek Cypriot coup seeking union with Greece.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
‘DELUSIONAL’: Targeting the families of Hamas’ leaders would not push the group to change its position or to give up its demands for Palestinians, Ismail Haniyeh said Israeli aircraft on Wednesday killed three sons of Hamas’ top political leader in the Gaza Strip, striking high-stakes targets at a time when Israel is holding delicate ceasefire negotiations with the militant group. Hamas said four of the leader’s grandchildren were also killed. Ismail Haniyeh’s sons are among the highest-profile figures to be killed in the war so far. Israel said they were Hamas operatives, and Haniyeh accused Israel of acting in “the spirit of revenge and murder.” The deaths threatened to strain the internationally mediated ceasefire talks, which appeared to gain steam in recent days even as the sides remain far
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of