Officials, who attended a series of memorial services on Sunday honouring the fallen of the Turkish invasion of 1974, missing persons and EOKA fighters, in various communities, conveyed the Government’s determination to continue efforts for a solution to the Cyprus problem.
Minister of Labour and Social Insurance Marinos Mousiouttas, in his eulogy at the annual memorial service for the fallen members of the 3rd Company of the 211 Infantry Battalion, held at the Church of Ayia Varvara in Kaimakli, said that the partition of the island ‘cannot and will never be accepted’.
Mousiouttas noted that ‘we are living through a period of intense diplomatic activity’. Referring to the visit of United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres to Cyprus last July, President Nikos Christodoulides’ successive meetings with the leader of the Turkish Cypriot community, contacts with the UN Secretary-General’s Personal Envoy Maria Angela Holguín, and the meetings held in New York in recent days, he said, they ‘serve one objective’.
‘That objective is to create the conditions for a broader format meeting and for the resumption of substantive negotiations from where they left off in 2017, without losing anything that has already been agreed,’ he said. Noting that the framework for a settlement was a bizonal, bicommunal federation with political equality, as defined by UN resolutions, he said that what is missing, ‘as the President stressed in New York, is the political will, which must come from Ankara’.
Minister of Health Neophytos Charalambides, in his eulogy at the memorial service for the 17-year-old EOKA hero, held in Palodia, Limassol, said that we must ‘not become accustomed to the division of our homeland’ and to continue, ‘with unity and steadfast commitment to justice’, the efforts to end the occupation and achieve the liberation of Cyprus.
Giving Evangelou as an example, he stressed the importance of service to the country, protecting unity, and commitment to its freedom, ‘even when the road ahead remains difficult’.
The need to resume negotiations on the Cyprus problem from the point at which they were interrupted, on the agreed basis and making use of the negotiating acquis, was stressed by Minister of Agriculture, Rural Development and Environment Christos Senekis, who also noted that the passage of time does not erase the consequences of the invasion, nor can it make partition a permanent situation.
Fifty-two years after the Turkish invasion, the occupation continues and Cyprus remains divided, the Minister said in his eulogy at the National Memorial Service for those who fell during the Turkish invasion and at the prayer service for the identification of missing persons from the Frenaros Municipal District.
President Christodoulides’ Government, he said, continues its efforts with consistency and determination to overcome the deadlock and resume substantive negotiations.
He noted that developments in recent months, the meetings held under the auspices of the United Nations Secretary-General, the European Union’s more active involvement and the Secretary-General’s ongoing efforts are creating, a framework within which every opportunity for progress must be fully explored.
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.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, whose term nears its end, announced he would convene another meeting in broader format, after adequate preparation, but gave no timeline. He secured to that end the consensus of both sides and of the guarantor powers. María Angela Holguín, Guterres’ Personal Envoy on Cyprus, is tasked to engage with the parties. Executive Vice-President Raffaele Fitto acts as the European Commission’s Special Representative for Cyprus, succeeding EU special envoy Johannes Hahn.