‘We obviously disagree on Cyprus, but only dialogue can be the antidote’
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Monday he and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan “obviously disagree” on the issue of the Cyprus problem, but that “only dialogue can be the antidote to any deadlock”.
Mitsotakis was speaking after a meeting with Erdogan in Ankara, saying, “we also discussed, obviously, the Cyprus problem, an issue which remains of the utmost importance for us.”
He said his support of dialogue was the reason “I am happy for the appointment of [United Nations Envoy Maria Angela] Holguin,” adding, “I believe she should be given the time to search for a solution within the framework of UN Security Council decisions.”
Erdogan had briefly touched on the matter of the Cyprus problem during the joint press conference the two held after the meeting, saying, “it is important to reach a fair and permanent solution to the Cyprus problem on the basis of the facts on the island.”
He added, “such a step will strengthen the stability and peace of our region.”
The meeting in Ankara came as Holguin completed her last full day of her latest visit to Cyprus.
She met with both President Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar, confirming after her meeting with Christodoulides that her current mandate is drawing to a close.
Pursuant to that, she said, I am going to prepare a report, I am going to have meetings with [UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres] in the coming days and then we will come back and see how we can continue to ‘push’.”
Her meeting with Tatar was brief, lasting less than 20 minutes. She also made no statements to the press after the meeting but did tell a reporter later in the day she had been “surprised” that Tatar had rejected a tripartite meeting with herself and Christodoulides.
After the meeting, Tatar had said, he had told her that a new process could begin “with the removal of the isolations and the emergence of the Turkish Cypriots’ sovereignty”, saying that she had at the time found these positions “reasonable”.
However, he said, “when she came again, she told us that there would be no opening on this front.”
In response, he said, “we expressed our opinion that if there is no initiative on this front, we cannot take the dialogue further. She accepted this understanding. She sees that there is no common ground. If there is no common ground, there is no future.”