Akinci: “whoever tries to stop the territory issue doesn’t want a settlement to be reached“
President Nicos Anastasiades on Tuesday confirmed that UN-brokered Cyprus peace talks will focus on the very thorny issue of territory in mid-November at a venue outside the divided island.
And that he still intends to ask the National Council to accompany him and the negotiating team wherever the crucial negotiations will be taking place – most probably in Switzerland.
At the same time, Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci told journalists that “the impression is that we are going to have a Buergenstock-type meeting on the territory issue and whoever tries to stop it means he doesn’t want a settlement to be reached.”
Negotiations on the UN-proposed Annan plan envisaging a united Cyprus made up of two loosely confederated ethnic zones took place in Buergenstock, near Lausanne, in 2004 between the then two leaders of Cyprus. As well as with the leaders of the island’s guarantors, that is Greece, Turkey and Britain.
The plan was rejected at a referendum by the vast majority of Greek Cypriots.
Akinci also said that Turkey, which still maintains thousands of troops in the breakaway north following a 1974 invasion, and Greece have already started discussions on the issue of guarantees post-settlement.
Turkey is the only one from the three countries which still wants to maintain a guarantor’s role in a reunited federal Cyprus.
