Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades said on Friday that his meeting with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci was positive and showed a possibility for a future negotiations to settle the Cyprus' issue
ATHENS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 09th August, 2019) Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades said on Friday that his meeting with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci was positive and showed a possibility for a future negotiations to settle the Cyprus' issue.The politicians had a three-hour meeting earlier in the day in the residence of the head of the United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus, Elizabeth Spehar. The mission said that the sides had agreed to have a trilateral meeting with the UN secretary-general.
"Today's meeting was creative and sincere regarding perspectives of renewing negotiations. During the meeting it was confirmed that the basis for solving the Cypriot issue remained the one agreed upon in 1977, i.e. bizonal bicommunal federation," Anastasiades said.
The Cypriot president added that despite having many disagreements, the sides intended to continue negotiating.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkey sent its forces to the island in order to allegedly protect the island's Turkish population. In 1983, the Republic of Northern Cyprus declared its independence, without being recognized by anyone except of Turkey. Since then, the reunification process has been ongoing, but not without occasional lapses, the last one being the failed 2017 Crans-Montana negotiations, after which the negotiations stopped in their tracks.
