New York meeting underway

The leaders of the two communities Demetris Christofias and Dervis Eroglu are currently in New York meeting with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon.

According to CyBC’s New York correspondent, the meeting started at 1pm local time (8pm in Cyprus) with a working lunch attended by five representatives of each community, lasting 90 minutes. After a half hour break, the tripartite meeting will start with each leader bringing four aides to the table.

The meeting is expected to last two hours at the end of which the Secretary-General will make a statement, the contents of which will have been agreed upon by the leaders.

According to UN sources, the statement will include a reference to the nature of the talks, what has been achieved so far and the steps that will follow.

The two leaders were called to New York based on the UN’s assessment that talks on the property issue need a push forward if any progress is to be made in the negotiations.

Ban, through his Good Offices team in Cyprus, is due to issue a progress report on the talks this month. The outcome of today’s meeting will play a significant role in the conclusions of that report.

Before leaving for New York, Christofias told Greek Cypriots that he was not going there to make concessions while Eroglu was quoted in the Turkish Cypriot press saying that the two leaders had reached “deadlock” on the property issue.
The Turkish Cypriot leader said Ban likely called the meeting before the report is due to hear objectively the thoughts of both sides and to try to overcome the deadlock.

The Cyprus Mail reports that British High Commissioner in Nicosia, Matthew Kidd, yesterday described the tripartite meeting as “important”, noting that “both sides have made concessions and offers and have come up with ideas, particularly in the past few weeks in the area of property”.

Kidd highlighted that reaching a solution required concessions from both sides.
He said British Prime Minister David Cameron had spoken on the phone with Christofias yesterday morning. Christofias “will be able to expect support from the UK and the Prime Minister for anything that he does to try to move us courageously towards an agreement,” he added.
Acting government spokesman Christos Christophides said yesterday that the Greek Cypriot side was going to the meeting “very well-prepared”.

He said Christofias’ package of proposals on the talks, regarding linking various chapters, returning Varosha, opening Famagusta port and calling an international conference, offered a way out for various issues on the Cyprus problem.
Christophides maintained that “these proposals are gaining ground internationally”.

Meanwhile, Turkey’s chief EU negotiator, Egemen Bagis, raised eyebrows when he suggested the Cyprus problem be solved “in the way that the Pope gets elected”. He proposed that all the players in the Cyprus problem lock themselves up in a room with the UN S-G and Security Council until the problem is solved.
Speaking to Turkish reporters in Athens on Tuesday, Bagis criticised Christofias for his pre-meeting build up.

“The world is not made up of the 59 seats in the parliament of south Cyprus,” he said, adding that there was a bigger world which “has had enough of the rejection of every proposal”.

“Where in the world does a leader on his way to New York for UN talks, after an appeal by the opposition, feel the need to promise that he won’t make many concessions?” he asked.

The Turkish minister added: “Turkey is ready for a solution but we are also ready for tension. We are ready for everything.”

Moreover, the UN Secretary-General’s Special Adviser on Cyprus, Mr Alexander Downer, speaking after separate meetings in New York with both Christofias and Eroglu, said “The Secretary General has a plan for how he wants the meeting to go and I don’t think there will be any problem for the two leaders. They will be happy about it”.

He added that he hoped the meeting would be productive because the negotiations “have lost momentum and we want them to see if this will help to give them a bit of new momentum”.