UN Secretary-General, Antonio Guterres, has specific moves in mind for the immediate period ahead regarding the Cyprus problem, Greek Cypriot negotiator Menelaos Menelaou said on Tuesday.
Speaking during a discussion at the Cyprus Forum in Nicosia, Menelaou said that, based on the meetings and discussions held in New York, it was clear that the UN Secretary-General ‘will not abandon the effort and will exhaust every possibility.’
‘He has specific moves in mind for the immediate period ahead, and we will see whether it will be possible to do something that puts things back on track and ensures that we preserve what I call the acquis of the talks,’ he said.
Menelaou stressed that the effort must continue, arguing that abandoning it would not simply leave the situation stagnant but would lead to further deterioration, given the already difficult situation surrounding the Cyprus problem and the wider regional instability and uncertainty.
He said the Greek Cypriot side had expected a change in the situation following the change in leadership of the Turkish Cypriot community. ‘Something which, at least so far, has not been confirmed in practice,’ he said, although he acknowledged some small steps and a shift that the Greek Cypriot side had recognised and sought to facilitate.
Among these, he pointed to the reference to political equality in the joint statement issued following the two leaders’ meeting last December. He described this as important because it represented a shift away from the previous demand for ‘sovereign equality’ towards a gradual, albeit slow and incomplete, return to the federal framework.
‘This, however, has not yet taken a complete form,’ Menelaou said. At the same time, he said Turkey continued to support a two-state solution.
According to Menelaou, the Greek Cypriot side went to the meetings in New York seeking a next step that would facilitate the ongoing effort. However, he said, it had not been possible to achieve this because there had been no response from the other side to efforts made up to the last moment to hold a trilateral meeting.
He stressed that assigning blame was not a priority for the Greek Cypriot side.
‘The facts are indisputable,’ he said, adding that the two sides naturally present different accounts of why progress has not been achieved.
Menelaou said the Greek Cypriot side did not describe the situation as a deadlock, but rather as an obstruction preventing the process from gaining momentum.
Convergences and resumption of talks
Regarding confidence-building measures, methodology and substance, Menelaou said that work on recording the convergences had progressed.
Referring to the UNSG’s Personal Envoy Maria Angela Holguin’s statement that the UN document recording the convergences would be made available to the parties at the start of a talks process, he said the Greek Cypriot side believed it should be released now in order to accelerate the next steps and reach the point of resuming negotiations.
He described the recording of the convergences as ‘a very important step’ towards preserving the acquis of the talks.
Menelaou recalled that, following his election as leader of the Turkish Cypriot community, Ersin Tatar’s successor, Tufan Erhurman, had put forward four proposals or conditions: reaffirmation of the convergences, reaffirmation of political equality, a timetable for the next steps and what had been described as ‘pre-agreed consequences’ to ensure that the situation would not remain unchanged in the event of failure.
‘We believe that three of the four have been addressed,’ he said, adding that two had been addressed through the recording of the convergences. He described as ‘very paradoxical’ the fact that, while reaffirmation of the convergences and political equality had been requested, obstacles were now being raised to their submission to all parties.
As regards a possible timetable, Menelaou said that, if an enlarged meeting were convened, the next steps could follow within a ‘very short timeframe’, provided the convergences were safeguarded and the focus was placed on the outstanding issues.
On ‘pre-agreed consequences’, he said there could also be a way forward through steps that would encourage a settlement rather than create incentives for failure.
Menelaou also said ‘a great deal’ had been achieved through confidence-building measures, although more could be done. Over the past 12 months, technical committees had met 119 times and implemented 39 projects, he said.
He also noted that the two leaders had held 11 meetings over the past 11 months, providing opportunities for substantive discussions on both the political substance of the Cyprus problem and technical issues.
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.