Talks
on the Cyprus problem continued with discussions on property, the legislature
and the executive on Wednesday.
According
to a statement by Spokesperson of the UN Good Offices Mission in Cyprus Michel
Bonnardeaux, the two negotiators “exchanged written proposals on different
matters and they also agreed that they will meet again on Saturday, June 14.”
“In
the meantime, a meeting of the property experts of the two sides will take
place,” Bonnardeaux said.
Government
spokesman Nikos Christodoulides said that Mavroyiannis and Ozersay discussed
the property issue, the legislative and the executive powers.
He
added that the two negotiators also exchanged views on the next steps.
Christodoulides said the Greek Cypriot side submitted a document on European
Union issues and the Turkish Cypriot side a document on the legislative power.
He
noted that at their next meeting, the negotiators will discuss EU-related
matters, citizenship, central government powers as well as the preparation of
the leaders’ next meeting on June 23.
Moreover,
the Cyprus Mail reports that Mr Christodoulides said that before moving on to
the give and take phase of reunification talks, the two communities must submit
their positions on all core issues, as the Turkish Cypriot side insisted that
no concession could be made on the rotating presidency.
Christodoulides
said the second phase of the talks was aimed at finding common ground between
the two sides and minimising differences in a bid to move on to the give and
take phase of the talks.
He
said the the UN statement after the Anastasiades-Eroglu meeting on Monday, that
the two sides had agreed to “submit and to continue submitting proposals on all
core issues, as well as to conclude this phase as soon as possible”, satisfied
the Greek Cypriot position of discussing interrelated matters at the same time “and
not just focus on issues like governance that mainly interest the Turkish
Cypriot side.”
On
Monday Eroglu said the two sides had differences on issues where there had
previously been agreement.
“The Greek Cypriots,” he said, “want the president
to always be Greek Cypriot and the vice president Turkish Cypriot instead of
having rotating presidency.”
Rotating
presidency had been put on the table by former President Demetris Christofias
on condition that Turkish Cypriots accepted cross-voting.
Eroglu rejects
cross-voting but he reiterated on Tuesday that rotating presidency was
necessary for his side and no concessions could be made.
Toumazos
Tselepis, former ruling party AKEL’s head of the Cyprus desk, said Eroglu’s
reaction was laughable, as it was a fact that rotating presidency had been on
the table since the beginning of the 90s and it was also a fact that it was
among the agreements between Christofias and former Turkish Cypriot leader
Mehmet Ali Talat as a package with cross-voting.
“It
was Eroglu himself who then rejected cross-voting,” Tselepis said, adding that the
results of Monday’s meeting were not encouraging, what with Eroglu on the one
hand declaring that he was in a hurry and on the other hand being unable to
realise what is self evident.
“For
the negotiating process to proceed to the third phase all chapters and their
aspects must be first discussed in detail, including territory, settlers, and
security,” Tselepis said.
Ozersay:
a geographical map for a road map
Turkish Cypriot daily Kibris Postasi reports that the Turkish Cypriot negotiator
Kudret Ozersay, speaking to the press after the negotiators meeting, said that
the Turkish Cypriot side is ready to negotiate land adjustments as soon as soon
as a roadmap leading to a
referendum is agreed on.
Ozersay claimed that if the Greek Cypriot side is
also willing, the process leading to a referendum can start without any delay.
He added, however, that if the Greek Cypriot side tables
proposals that deviate from the agreed conversions, such proposals will be
ignored by the Turkish Cypriot side.
“This
was made clear to the Greek Cypriot side today,” he said.
Ozersay said
that “property and federal executive issues were discussed and new proposals on
federal legislative and the EU were put forward. After that, several ideas
regarding the timeline of the process and when and how we can proceed to the
next phase were exchanged.”
“We submitted a proposal on the property issue during our last meeting
and today the Greek Cypriot side shared their opinions regarding that proposal
and we asked some questions about their proposal. Today we agreed that the
property experts meeting where the property issue will be elaborated in detail will
take place next week,” he said.
He also said
that the Turkish Cypriot side had presented a proposal on federal legislative
while the Greek Cypriot side had put forward a proposal on the EU issue.
Ozersay said
that as a half century old conflict, the Cyprus problem is a challenging one
and that the process requires lot of goodwill and effort.
“The presence
of a road map is very essential in this process in order to achieve some
progress. We have to move forward despite certain challenges”, he added.
Nami: The Turkish side insists on the rotating presidency
Turkish
Cypriot daily Kibris reports that Turkish Cypriot Foreign Minister Ozdil Nami, has said that the Turkish Cypriot side cannot accept the proposal that
the president in a possible partnership state should only come from the Greek
Cypriot community so insist on a rotating presidency.
Nami added
that he has become pessimistic after
the recent meeting between the two leaders.
Nami said that “significant progress” had been
achieved in the past in the chapters on government and power sharing, the EU
and economy but the fact that the past convergences’ papers have not been
properly used at the negotiating table is an indication of the “deep
disagreements between the sides”.
“The
convergences had been formed under the UN supervision. Therefore, the UN should
defend them”, he said, adding that as long as President Anastasiades continues not
to accept the past convergences, it is not possible for the negotiations to go
well.
Moreover,
he said that the submission of a
proposal by the Greek Cypriot side saying that the president of the partnership
state should be elected by a simple majority is an indication that the climate at
the negotiating table “is not good at all”.
Nami
went on and claimed that US Vice President’s visit “was wasted” because the
Greek Cypriot side’s efforts were directed towards issues such as Varosha.
Experts
at failed negotiations
An
editorial in the Cyprus Mail says it is very difficult to say what is actually
going on, if anything, at the Cyprus talks. Monday’s long meeting between
President Anastasiades and Dervis Eroglu, which was supposed to have cleared things
up, added to the general confusion, giving the impression that the two sides
are on a different wavelength, each pursuing its own agenda regardless.
The
paper says that the meeting of the two leaders, rather than help the talks move
faster, seem to have achieved the exact opposite, with the two leaders
introducing new areas of disagreement, both in relation to procedure and
substance.
As
we depend on the information given out selectively by both sides we cannot
reach any safe conclusions, especially as what we hear regularly changes. To
start with, it was reported that Eroglu rejected the Talat-Christofias
convergences and wanted the talks to start from scratch. But did Anastasiades
accept the convergences? Not all of them, because on Monday he expressed his
opposition to the rotating presidency and reportedly made a ‘president and
vice-president’ proposal that was unacceptable to Eroglu.
Then
there is the issue of the procedure, with Anastasiades demanding the submission
of proposals on all chapters of the Cyprus problem including territory and
security and Eroglu refusing to do so. Without this being done it is not
possible to move to the third phase of the process which is supposed to be the ‘give
and take’ negotiations, at which stage the settlement would supposedly be
finalised.
But
it does not appear likely the third phase will arrive any time soon as the two
sides have agreed on more time-consuming issues such as the return to the idea
of the technical committees. Apparently, a committee would now be set up to
discuss issues relating to the EU, which had to be agreed in the past and are
not an issue because the European Commission has made it clear it would accept
anything the two sides agreed.
The
problem, the paper conclueds, is that the two sides do not seem prepared to
agree on anything, which was why they were back at their default position – the
blame game – in the last few days. How many more times do we have to hear about
the Greek Cypriots ignoring the facts on the ground and Turkish Cypriots being
intransigent? Many more, we are afraid, because, as we all know, both sides
have acquired an expertise in failed negotiations.
