The leaders of the two communities in Cyprus, President Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman will hold a meeting on Friday afternoon (1600 local time) without the presence of media on site.
The meeting will be hosted by Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in Cyprus, Khassim Diagne at his residence in the buffer zone of Nicosia airport.
President Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader held a private meeting on April 6th. The UN press release issued afterwards said that the two leaders had welcomed the continued commitment and involvement of the UN Secretary General in the Cyprus problem and had reiterated their continued readiness to support his efforts.
During that meeting they had reviewed the progress made on confidence-building initiatives and had agreed to meet again by the end of April with a view to making more specific announcements.
Following that meeting, President Christodoulides had spoken of progress on certain CBMs on which announcements are expected at their next meeting.
Greek Cypriot negotiator, Menelaos Menelaou and representative of the Turkish Cypriot leader, Mehmet Dana, had a meeting on Monday.
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.