President of Cyprus, Nikos Christodoulides, is expected to meet anew with the UN Secretary-General Personal Envoy, María Ángela Holguín, on Friday evening, in their second tete-a-tete since the UN envoy’s arrival to the island, earlier this month.
The meeting is scheduled to take place at 5:00 p.m. (local time) at the Presidential Palace.
On Saturday, María Ángela Holguín is also expected to meet again with the Turkish Cypriot leader, Tufan Erhrman.
Holguín’s meetings with the two leaders follow the initial meetings she held with them last Monday.
On Tuesday, the Personal Envoy held separate meetings with the two negotiators. The possibility of a joint meeting was not discussed, ahead of the new separate meetings with the leaders.
According to CNA sources, during her meetings with the negotiators, Holguín continued discussions on preparations for an informal multilateral meeting planned for late July to early August. According to the same sources, the talks are focused ‘solely on substantive issues’ and not on Confidence-Building Measures (CBMs).
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 due to Turkish intransigence. The latest round of negotiations, in July 2017 at the Swiss resort of Crans-Montana ended inconclusively.
In 2025 the Secretary-General hosted two informal meetings on Cyprus, in March in Geneva and in July in New York, while a tripartite meeting with the Cyprus leaders was also held in late September, at the end of the UN General Assembly High Level Week. An informal meeting in broader format that was expected to take place before the end of 2025, is yet to be announced. María Angela Holguín, the UN Secretary-General’s Personal Envoy on Cyprus, is tasked to engage with the parties.