Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias had a telephone conversation on Wednesday with his Cypriot counterpart Nikos Chrsitodoulides whom he briefed on the outcome of the meeting which the Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis had earlier on the same day in London with the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on the sidelines of the NATO Summit, the Cyprus News Agency (CNA) has learned.
                                                           
Diplomatic sources have also said that during the meeting of the National Council, that took place on Wednesday, in Nicosia, apart from being briefed about the results of the meeting which Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades had in Berlin on November 25 with the UNSG Antonio Guterres and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci, political party leaders were also briefed on the issue of the Memorandum of Understanding between Turkey and Libya on the delimitation of maritime zones. The same sources said that Nicosia has been taking steps with a view to effectively address and change the current situation, refraining however to say which these steps are.
                                                       
 
The Foreign Ministry of the Republic of Cyprus has condemned the signing of the MoU between Turkey and Libya, purportedly aiming at the delimitation of maritime zones in between them, noting that “this kind of delimitation, if it went through, would constitute a grave violation of the international law, since it would disregard the legal rights of all coastal states in the Eastern Mediterranean and would go contrary to the acknowledged principle of the Convention on the Law of the Sea and of customary law regarding the rights of islands to EEZs and continental shelf.”
 
Moreover the same sources said that during the National Council meeting, political party leaders asked to be informed about the meeting which Cyprus Foreign Minister Nikos Christodoulides had recently in Washington with the US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
 
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkish troops invaded and occupied 37% of its territory.

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