All parties are about to agree on the appointment of a new United Nations Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Cyprus, Yeniduzen reports.
The matter has been under discussion for a while, and chief negotiator and President Ersin Tatar’s special representative, Ergün Olgun, said that they were in the process of reaching an agreement to appoint a “personal” rather than “special” representative.
Olgun said that the representative who was likely to be appointed will ask: “Is there a common ground for negotiations or not?” The representative’s task would be to search for the answer.
“The difference here is that instead of the question ‘Is there a basis for a federal* solution?’ The question will be ‘Is there a common ground between the parties for negotiations?‘”.
*President Tatar has made it clear that he will not negotiate for a federal solution but demands recognition of the TRNC as a sovereign state [Ed.]
Pointing out that the answer to this question is ‘no’, Nami said, “Can his representative have any authority that the UN Secretary-General does not have? The view mentioned by Mr. Ergün has nothing to do with the working system of the UN. There is no logical basis. Whoever comes from the UN is bound by the decisions of the UN Security Council“, he noted.
Nami recalled that the UN Secretary-General’s Interim Special Adviser on Cyprus, Jane Holl Lute, who served in the past years, was also appointed to make an observation on whether there was a common ground regarding the negotiations, Nami said, “She submitted a report stating that there was no common vision and returned home.”
However, Olgun confirmed that the negotiating delegations from the two communities continue their meetings, and said that the meetings in question are “concerning the solutions to daily problems“.
Stating that the meetings, which were suspended during the UN General Assembly in New York, had resumed last Thursday, Olgun said, “In the last meeting, for example, we discussed the issue of fake insurance used in crossings. There are too many people being arrested on this issue. Is this a personal mistake or is there a network behind it? We brought these issues to the agenda at the joint contact point attended by police from both sides“.
Stating that another issue they put on the agenda is related to the Kermia/Metehan, border checkpoint Olgun said, “We are close to an agreement on an improvement project. We reached a general agreement on issues such as renewing passageways and increasing the number of checkpoints. Details of these are being discussed. A decision was made in principle. This is good news“, he said.
