Our overall strategy is to substantially upgrade the Republic of Cyprus to face internal and external challenges, said President of the Republic Nikos Christodoulides has in an interview, noting that all the Government’s actions serve the great goal of resolving the Cyprus problem.
In his interview with Phileleftheros, the first part of which was published on Sunday, 28 December, President Christodoulides said that the Government’s overall strategy is to substantially upgrade the Republic of Cyprus, and to face internal and external challenges “that we cannot face on our own”. “All our actions undoubtedly serve the great goal of resolving the Cyprus problem,” he added.
He noted that diplomatic actions regarding foreign policy do not in any way negatively affect the efforts to resolve the Cyprus problem.
He also said that political equality, as per the UN resolutions, “has never been questioned by us.” He noted that political equality was questioned by former leader of the Turkish Cypriot community Ersin Tatar, who interpreted it as sovereign equality, he said.
Regarding the new Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhürman’s statements on political equality, he said that governance is one of the six chapters of the Cyprus problem and all of them should be discussed with the aim of resolving the Cyprus problem. For the Turkish Cypriots, he said, governance is important while security and guaranteesfor were important for the Greek Cypriots, “but we do not set them as a condition for resuming talks.” He expressed hope that the talks would resume as soon as possible.
He pointed out that the availability of the Greek Cypriot side to participate in a meeting on the Cyprus issue is not affected at all by Cyprus’ Presidency of the Council of the EU.
President Christodoulides also said that they do not have any indications of US intervention in the Cyprus issue, and that the US has not made any allusion to this. The discussions with the US on the Cyprus issue are part of the general context of discussions on the region and the need for Cyprus to be a reliable and predictable partner of the US in the region, he added.
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. Another informal meeting in broader format is expected soon.
(Source: CNA)
