Cyprus’s leaders meet for talks on ending division

Press, 25 August 1988, Page 10

Cyprus’s leaders meet for talks on ending division

NZPA-Reuter Geneva For the first time in three years, the leaders of Cyprus's two rival communities will meet today in a fresh bid to revive talks aimed at ending the 14-year-division of the island.

The United Nations Secretary-General, Javier Perez de Cuellar, will host a private lunch for Cyprus President, George Vassiliou, and Turkish-Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash. Mr Perez de Cuellar is due to issue a statement after the get acquainted meal saying the two leaders agree to open formal peace negotiations in Cyprus in mid-Septem-ber, delegates said.

Oscar Camilion, who took up his duties as United Nations special representative on Cyprus in February, will attend the tinhtlv-euarded lunch and

mediate the formal negotiations. Both sides have called for a unified federal republic, but acknowledge that deep mistrust and major stumbling blocks must be overcome before

the two communities can be joined.

Mr Vassiliou arid Mr Denktash — who are staying at the same luxury hotel in Geneva — paid separate courtesy visits on Mr Perez de Cuellar at the United Nations European headquarters.

Both called afterwards for peace within a year on the Mediterranean island, as targeted by the United Nations. “This is what I hope to achieve — peace next year,” said Mr Vassiliou, a millionaire businessman elected six months ago.

"That is what we shall try to do. I hope we succeed,” said Mr Denk-

tash, leader of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Cyprus was divided in 1974. when Turkey seized the northern third of the island after a coup by Athens-backed officers.

Mr Denktash and two of Mr Vassiliou’s predecessors, Archbishop Makarios and Spyros Kyprianou, signed United Nations agreements in 1977 and 1979 agreeing that the basis for a settlement should be the establishment, of a bizonal federal republic.

These documents are expected to be the starting point for resuming the stalled negotiations, which collapsed in 1985.

The two sides disagree over a timetable for the withdrawal of Turkey’s 29,000 troops stationed in the northern third of the island, as well as provisions for the “three freedoms” (of movement of citizens, property ownership and settlement). "These outstanding issues will be the subject of lengthy, painful negotiations,” one GreekCypriot delegate told Reuters.