President Nikos Christodoulides described his meeting with Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman on Tuesday as “a very good and constructive discussion”, which he said would continue while UN envoy Maria Angela Holguin is in Cyprus.
Because the discussion would continue during Holguin’s stay, the two leaders had agreed not to make further statements on specific issues or to issue a joint statement, Christodoulides told reporters on his return to the Presidential Palace.
In the second part of the meeting, the leaders met jointly with the technical committees on youth and on cultural heritage, and with the civil society advisory body. The discussions were constructive, Christodoulides said, and views and suggestions were heard that he would discuss in his meetings with Erhurman.
Three proposals on the table
Before leaving the Presidential Palace for the meeting, Christodoulides said he regarded it as positive that one of the 19 proposals he had submitted had been accepted, allowing the joint meetings with the two technical committees and the civil society body to go ahead.
He noted that setting up the civil society body had been the Greek Cypriot side’s proposal, and that the youth technical committee had first been suggested by the UN’s Rosemary DiCarlo during a visit to Cyprus in 2023. The Greek Cypriot side had accepted it at once, he said, and the Turkish Cypriot side two years later.
In the first part of the meeting, he said, he would focus on three of his 19 proposals. The first was a new proposal on crossing points, the third or fourth alternative he had put forward, if he remembered correctly, to achieve a positive result.
The second was the proposal on the fenced-off area of Famagusta and direct trade. Christodoulides said it was mutually beneficial and would test all sides in practice on whether they truly wanted to move towards bold confidence-building measures that would send a strong message to society as a whole.
The third was a Greek Cypriot proposal on methodology, which he had submitted to the UN Secretary-General and to Holguin in New York and had previously shared with Erhurman. It concerns a way forward on confidence-building measures and on resuming talks, he said.
Crossing points
Christodoulides said an alternative proposal on crossing points had already been submitted and he was awaiting a reply, and that he would comment publicly on whether it replaced the Kokkina issue once that reply came.
He recalled that during the UN Secretary-General’s visit to Cyprus, at their initial bilateral meeting, the Secretary-General put forward a new proposal on Pyroi–Athienou and Mia Milia, which Christodoulides understood he had also shared with Erhurman.
The Secretary-General had expected an announcement that evening at a dinner, where he described the proposal as a reasonable compromise, Christodoulides said. The Greek Cypriot side accepted it, but the Turkish Cypriot side did not.
He said the Greek Cypriot side constantly put forward proposals and new ideas, wanted developments and was proving this in practice through concrete proposals and actions, not only through statements.
At the start of Tuesday’s meeting, the United Nations gave each leader a bottle of oil from olive trees planted at the venue in 2009 by the then President, Demetris Christofias, and the then Turkish Cypriot leader, Mehmet Ali Talat.
Information from Cyprus News Agency
