A delegation of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Cyprus in the British Parliament (APPG-CYP) arrives on Tuesday in Cyprus for a two-day official visit, following an invitation by the House of Representatives.
A House of Representatives press release says that the delegation is led by Group Chair, Conservative MP Caroline Nokes and Honorary Group Chair, Conservative MP Sir Roger Gale and Labour MPs Fabian Hamilton (Vice-Chair of APPG-CYP), Bambos Charalambous (Honorary Secretary of APPG-CYP) and Paulette Hamilton. The delegation is accompanied by President of the National Federation of Cypriots in the UK, Christos Karaolis.
During their stay in Cyprus, the British MPs will be received by President Nikos Christodoulides and House of Representatives President Annita Demetriou.
They will also have separate meetings with President of the Parliamentary Committee on Foreign and European Affairs Harris Georgiades and Members of the Committee and with the head of the Cypriot delegation to the Parliamentary Commonwealth Association (CPA) Aristos Damianou.
The British delegation will also have a meeting with the Mayor of occupied Famagusta Simos Ioannou and members of the Famagusta Municipal Council, at the Cultural Center of the Municipality in Deryneia.
The British deputies will also visit the buffer zone in Nicosia, accompanied by members of the UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus and the anthropological laboratory of the Committee on Missing Persons in Cyprus (CMP), where they will have a meeting with the members of the Committee.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkey invaded and occupied its northern third. Repeated rounds of UN-led peace talks have so far failed to yield results.
The latest round of negotiations, in July 2017 at the Swiss resort of Crans-Montana ended inconclusively.
A Committee on Missing Persons has been established, upon agreement between the leaders of the two communities, with the scope of exhuming, identifying and returning to their relatives the remains of 492 Turkish Cypriots and 1,510 Greek Cypriots, who went missing during the inter-communal fighting of 1963-1964 and in 1974.
