Greek Foreign Minister Kotzias to visit Cyprus on October 28th
ΣΧΕΤΙΚΑ ΑΡΘΡΑ
The Greek Foreign Minister Nicos Kotzias will be visiting Cyprus 26-28 October, amidst difficulties which have arisen in the negotiation process between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots for a peaceful solution of the Cyprus problem.
Ministry sources in Athens have told the Cyprus News Agency that Kotzias will address “these difficulties” during talks in Nicosia with President Anastasiades, Foreign Minister Ioannis Kassoulides and leaders of the parliamentary parties.
This will be his first official visit to Cyprus, and according to sources in Greece, the ongoing discussions between the two sides on the island are “at the frontline of positions which have been expressed and have puzzled the minister many times”.
The same sources suggest that Kotzias is “well informed” about the current flow of the negotiations and has been briefed by the Greek Cypriot side on the difficulties which have emerged lately due to the idea of “guaranteed majorities” and “derogations from EU regulations” concerning free movement and settlement of citizens, put on the table by the Turkish Cypriot leader Moustafa Akinci.
The Greek Foreign Minister is said to have “his own opinion” regarding these issues, which he will express publicly once in Nicosia.
On the other hand, Athens believes that regardless of current difficulties in the negotiations, “difficulties which in any such process are inevitable and expected”, a foreign ministry official told CNA, it seems as if diplomatic efforts regarding security issues which have been pursued by Kotzias, may be fruitful.
During his 3-day visit to Cyprus, Nicos Kotzias will stress once more that the need for the two sides to terminate “the regime of the guarantor powers”, Britain, Turkey and Greece, goes hand-in-hand with the need to see all foreign troops, and especially Turkey’s occupation army, leave the island.
On the last day of his official meeting, Kotzias will overlook the 28th of October military parade in Nicosia, in remembrance of the day when Greece entered the 2nd World War in 1940 against the powers of the axis. Cypriot citizens fought alongside the allied powers in their struggle against the Nazis.
Christos Michaelides – Greece, ATHENS, CNA/CM/GV/2015 – ENDS, CYPRUS NEWS AGENCY