Morphou issue not on table, says UN’s Cyprus envoy

NICOSIA

Cihan Photo

Territorial land settlement issues, among them the status of the town of Morphou, were currently not on the negotiating table at the United Nations-brokered peace talks for Cyprus, a U.N. envoy has said. 

U.N. special envoy for Cyprus Espen Barth Eide said March 10 after a meeting with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akıncı that the issue of Morphou was not yet on the table.

“It is an established fact that the territorial land issues will be discussed in the last days [of the talks],” said Eide, while coming out of a meeting with Akıncı, before he met with Greek Cypriot leader Nicos Anastasiades on March 10.  

“This [the Morphou issue] has not been negotiated yet and it will,” said Eide, adding there had been many difficult issues addressed since the negotiations began. “So there has been no substantive discussion on the issue.”

The two leaders of Cyprus were scheduled to meet on March 11 in Nicosia for peace talks under the guidance of Eide. 

The talks were re-launched in May 2015 one month after Akıncı was elected as the Turkish Cypriot community’s new president. 

Negotiation sessions have since ramped up and both of the leaders have expressed developments in the talks. 

“We are not in the final stage of the process and since there is an agreement that the land issue is among the final issues [to be addressed], I think it’s quite clear that it is not on the table right now,” Eide reiterated. 

The eastern Mediterranean island was divided into Turkish and Greek Cypriot sides after Turkey’s 1974 intervention following a military coup in Greece.