Cyprus Talks: Akıncı evaluates talks, calls on UN to announce reasons behind failed talks

President of the Turkish Republic of North Cyprus, Mustafa Akıncı has called on the United Nations to openly announce the reasons behind the failure of the just concluded Cyprus talks in Crans Montana, Switzerland.

Akinci who made the call on Tuesday July 11 during the Press Day reception said the UN is trying to keep an equal distance from the two sides, in order to maintaining their role as a facilitator of the negotiation procedure.

He noted that all the sides concerned in the talks had started describing its own reasons for the talks failure, saying that he wished the UN would openly explain the reasons for the failure.

He stated that the talks which have been on going for 50 years now could not continue for another 50 years.

I repeatedly stated that this conference was a decision conference. But if anyone attended the talks to create some slogan to use in the elections then there is nothing we can do. Zero troops and zero guarantees became a slogan which will be used until the elections in February. However it is not possible to produce a result with this slogan, he said.

Akıncı said that Greece and the Greek Cypriot side had refused to negotiate even when Turkey and the Turkish Cypriot side had shown the necessary flexibility to reach a settlement in Cyprus.

Referring to the withdrawal of Turkish troops, Akinci said that “a presence of 40,000 troops was preferred instead of a few hundred”.

They chose to accept the presence of 40 thousand troops rather than a contingent made up of a few hundred soldiers. This is the result he said.

Akinci said that agreement could have been reached to gradually reduce the number of troops on the island as trust, confidence and cooperation between the two sides grew.

This unfortunately was prevented due to the slogan adopted by the Greek Cypriot side, he said.

Akinci said that there were clear messages sent to the Greek Cypriot side that the issue of guarantees could be re–examined, and that the sides had serious differences on other chapters besides the guarantees chapter. 

Akinci who contested for election with the promise of working for a bi-zonal, bi-communal federal settlement, said this however did not mean that he would accept any settlement no matter what the cost.

I will not sign an agreement that will push our people to uncertainty he said.

According to him, there were disagreements on the chapters of territorial and political equality.

A thousand games were played in order to set aside the Turkish Cypriot demand for the need of a positive Turkish Cypriot vote in federal institutions where there would not have been equal representation, he said. 

He said that the UN Secretary General had come up with a property criteria that would work in favour of the current occupants on both sides, which the Turkish Cypriot side had accepted but added that he could not approve a formula that would push the Turkish Cypriots into uncertainty.

 

Speaking on territory, Akinci said despite all sensitivities on the issue, the Turkish Cypriot side, in agreement with Turkey, had taken a step forward based on the map that they had presented earlier, stating that the Greek Cypriot leader Nicos Anastasiades had insisted on his own map or the map presented in the Annan Plan, which he said would be far from the truth to claim that the conference had failed just because of the issue of security and guarantees.

He said the Turkish Cypriot side will continue to work on planning for the future.

I’m not saying that everything is over but we shall sit down and evaluate the situation. We cannot accept the Greek Cypriot side’s proposals. They too have to evaluate this situation and listen to what we are saying. They must understand our concerns. This is the only way we can create a framework for a new relationship in the future he added.

He added that the Turkish Cypriot side will evaluate the situation carefully and that they will not be a “patch” to the Greek Cypriots, but will also not become a province of Turkey.