Planning for what’s being billed as an “enlarged meeting” of the sides involved in the Cyprus issue, under the UN’s auspices, was the subject of a brief discussion on Tuesday between UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres and Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides.
The contacts, according to a report by the Cyprus News Agency (CAN), came on the sidelines of the COP29 conference on climate change, which is taking place in Baku, Azerbaijan.
In the same dispatch, unnamed government sources quoted by CNA said Guterres intimated that the planning for such a meeting is proceeding based on discussions that took place during an informal dinner on Oct. 15 last month.
The report said “all sides” have replied in the affirmative to the meeting, where Cyprus President Christodoulides, representing the Greek Cypriot community, will by all accounts meet with the Turkish Cypriot side.
The same report has Rosemary DiCarlo, the UN Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs, arriving on the island republic to coordinate and prepare the highly anticipated meeting, “with Guterres interested in a result from this meeting,” the same sources maintained.
An especially noteworthy development from Baku is the fact that Christodoulides met with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, with talks reportedly touching on what was previously discussed last week in Budapest, sources told CNA.
The meeting between the Republic of Cyprus’ head of state and the Turkish foreign minister, who represents the country that illegally occupies one-third of the island republic, is in itself noteworthy.
