Turkish-Greek Cypriots meet for reunification talks

Turkish-Cypriot President Mustafa Akıncı and Greek-Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades met at the U.N. buffer zone in Cyprus yesterday under the framework of reunification talks of the long-divided island.

The ongoing talks had experienced a two-month hiatus due to the Greek Cypriot assembly's decision to introduce a school commemoration of the 1950 Enosis referendum on unific ation with Greece.

As the move by the Greek-Cypriot administration was perceived as a deviation from the stated goal of reunifying the island as a federation, Akıncı indicated that a "solution cannot be reached in the talks if the Greek side maintains ill-intentions."

However, with Greek-Cypriots shelving the enosis decision, the talks restarted on April 11. The latest meeting between the negotiators on Tuesday lasted for nine hours.

Though the aim of the meeting between Cypriot leaders Akıncı and Anastasiades is to determine whether the talks should be moved to Geneva or not, sources have stated new talks on the reunification are likely to be held until the beginning of June.

Commenting on the meeting between Akıncı and Anastasiades, the United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) spokesman Aleem Siddique stated it would not be the end of the line if Turkish and Greek Cypriot leaders fail to seal the deal on a new Geneva conference on Wednesday.

The reunification talks, brokered by U.N. Special Cyprus Envoy Espen Barth Eide, were launched in May 2015 to discuss a permanent settlement for the divided Mediterranean island.