Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades said on Monday that he is not as optimistic as he would like to be about the informal tripartite meeting with UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar set to take place on September 27, in New York.

Speaking during a press conference in New York, President Anastasiades referred to the meeting he will have with the UN Secretary General, as well as with other state leaders, making special reference to the tripartite informal meeting he will have with the UNSG and Turkish Cypriot leader.

The UN Secretary General will hold a lunch meeting for the leaders of the two communities on September 27, with the aim of finding common ground for the resumption of talks. President Anastasiades said that he is not as optimistic as he would like to be because of the repeated statements by either Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan or Foreign Affairs Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu or  Tatar. President Anastasiades also emphasised that although he is ready to attend a meeting with the Secretary General and  Tatar, he would be over-optimistic if he were to say that it is likely to have a positive outcome.

President Anastasiades referenced in his remarks that on August 30 he had sent a letter to the Secretary General, “reiterating his readiness and determination not only to participate in a meeting with the Secretary General and Tatar, but also to put forward positions that along with the opposite side’s good will can assist to resume a meaningful, creative dialogue, which will lead to a solution within the UN framework and which will lead to a functioning and therefore sustainable state, respecting the concerns of both communities and with full respect for the European acquis and human rights in general.”

As he pointed out, “if there is good will from the other side, it’s possible that it will yield results, just like during the meetings with the Secretary General in June 2017 and November 2019.”  He recalled that 2017 resulted in the Crans – Montana conference.

Unfortunately, in 2019 in Berlin, the President of the Republic noted, “despite the agreement of the leaders with the Secretary General and despite the joint statement outlining the parameters that talks could be based upon to proceed, this failed due to Ankara`s interventions, objections and pretexts, which were used by the latter in order to avoid a resumption of substantive negotiations, aiming on the basis of the work achieved in previous years to continue and to reach an agreement.”

President Anastasiades added that “I would be over-optimistic to say, taking into account the positions of Tatar, reiterating what is dictated by Ankara, that there can be a positive result.”

However, he continued, what is important is that the meeting takes place, “that we are determined to give it our all, in the sense of clarifying proposals that have been submitted, and if the other side shows good will and redefines goals, to create conditions that will allow us to continue towards a new dialogue.”

He further added that “I am not as optimistic as I would like to be in the face of repeated statements by either Erdogan or Cavusoglu, that a prerequisite for starting a dialogue is the recognition of the sovereignty of the illegally formed state.”

He then expressed the hope that “after the strong condemnations by both the UNSC and the EU, but also by many countries that play a role in the international arena, that positions that have been submitted in writing to the Secretary General, in April in Geneva during the informal Summit, will be reassessed or changed, and it is my wish that I express the hope that there will be a shift from the positions they expressed then, and I say a wish because unfortunately Tatar repeats the same today as in the past.”

President Anastasiades noted that he would regularly forward the various alternative proposals to resolve the stalemate to the Secretary-General, whether they concerned decentralization of powers to reduce possible conflicts in the centre, or parliamentary democracy, or substantive Confidence Building Measures that would allow for a positive political climate leading to the creation of the necessary conditions for the resumption of talks, or the very recent reference to a return to the Constitution of `60 under certain conditions, of course, in order to ensure the continued existence of the state and its evolution in what has been agreed upon in the UN resolutions.

“Therefore, referring to the Establishment Treaties, we also refer to the prohibition of joining part or all or secession of part or all with any state or secession from the central state and consequently the basis of negotiation is restored, as originally agreed far and beyond the recognition of Turkish claims for sovereignty”, he said.

Continuing, the President said that if we followed the example of Tatar, it would be easy for the Greek side and fully justified, “if we set as a condition for the resumption of the dialogue the termination of the guarantees and the withdrawal of the occupying troops or the territorial readjustments, so that there is something that will not only satisfy one but both communities and will especially speak to the concerns of the Greek Cypriots.”

He also said “what I will stress to the Secretary General is that the terms of reference and the resolutions provide the common ground for the resumption of the dialogue, without ignoring the work produced until Crans Montana through convergences, through agreements that have been reached.”

Asked what the UN Secretary-General expects to do given the position of the Turkish Cypriot side on two states and the Greek Cypriot side on the 1960 Constitution, the President said:  “the problem is that you equate the unacceptable and unresolved proposals of the Turks and Turkish Cypriots to change the basis of the solution, with a proposal that wants to restore order in terms of the procedure to be followed or the final solution.”

The reinstatement of the provisions of the Constitution of the `60s, he noted, “responds to the allegations of the Turkish Cypriot side, that we exclude it from participating in the administration of the country and that supposedly the administration is Greek Cypriot. Secondly, it refers to the High Level Agreements, UN resolutions and EU principles in the effort to reach a solution. The High Level Agreements are clear and determine what the solution will be, just as the resolutions and the terms of office of the Secretary General to, that is to say that by no means do they deviate from the agreed solution basis.”

On the contrary, he said, “with the reference to the Constitution of `60 we restore the right basis, based on the Establishment Treaties and the evolution of the Republic of Cyprus based on the High Level Agreements. That was my statement and that is what you should be taking away, instead of what some people choose to take out of context and imply that we are returning to a unitary state.”

It would be wishful thinking, the President added, if we could do something similar. “But after 1974 and the urgent need for high-level agreements determined the form of solution. What we are asking for is a solution that leads to a truly functioning state that ensures long-term duration, continuity and protection of the human rights of all the inhabitants of the Republic of Cyprus. “Therefore, the parallelism or correlation with the out-of-context EU proposals of the Turkish Cypriots has nothing to do with the return, or reference to, conditions that lead to an evolution within the framework of the UN resolutions.”

Asked why he is now making this proposal and did not do so years ago, the President said “simply because Turkey`s new proposals through its representative in Tatar speak of recognition of sovereignty over the illegal regime and a change in the basis of a two-state solution. It`s a response (my suggestion) to a return to the UN resolutions and to the terms of the Secretary-General`s mandate.”

Asked what he could expect from Erdogan`s stance, the President said: “I have said that there is little hope for a positive outcome, and as you rightly note, due to Turkish intransigence, the Turkish revisionist stance.” “Ankara`s neo-Ottoman orientations, which do not only concern the Cyprus issue but extend to the questioning of Greece`s sovereign rights in the Aegean, intervene in Libya, Syria, Iraq and also expand in the Caucasus, intervening between Armenia and Azerbaijan.”

We are watching, said President Anastasiades, “not just rhetoric, but in practice a disastrous, in my opinion, vision of Turkey which may appear to create a superpower, but this will be seen over time, how it can lead to an economic destruction or worse of a country, with Erdogan`s over-optimistic fantasies.”

Asked to comment on reports that the UN SG’s Special Envoy on Cyprus Jane Holl Lute was leaving, the President replied that “it seems that Lute`s service is being terminated for reasons of conflict of interest, in view of the fact that she has taken over a position in the board of directors of an oil company and it was perceived that this might bring her into conflict with the interests of either Turkey or Cyprus.”

Finally, he said that a similar proposal, i.e. for the appointment of a special envoy and the start of negotiations on issues related to the two communities, had been submitted by Guterres in Geneva during the informal meeting.

“Our side immediately accepted the invitation, the Turkish side rejected it. I will repeat that we agree with a similar position to that of the Secretary General, with an active role in shaping conditions as a special envoy, and let us hope that those who rejected it will listen to the Secretary General this time if they are in good faith “, concluded the President of the Republic.
 
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkish troops invaded and occupied 37% of its territory. Numerous UN backed talks to reunite the island have failed to yield results.