The Secretary-General of the UN, António Guterres, has started this Tuesday a visit to Cyprus with the aim of giving new impetus to the talks for the reunification of the island, although he has insisted that it is the involved parties who must move towards an understanding and that "the UN cannot impose peace."
Guterres has framed his trip in the "commitment to support the Cypriot communities in the search for a comprehensive and sustainable agreement to the conflict," emphasizing that the role of the United Nations is to accompany and support, but not to replace the will of local actors.
"The UN cannot impose peace. Only the Cypriots, through their leaders, can build it," the Portuguese leader reiterated after meeting with the President of Cyprus, Nikos Christodoulides, and with the President of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, Tufan Erhurman, to whom he assured that he will do "everything" in his power to support both communities "at this very important moment."
The Secretary-General has described his trip as "a visit of solidarity with the people of Cyprus and to demonstrate my firm commitment to ensuring that we finally find a solution to the Cyprus problem. This depends on the Cypriots themselves, although the guarantor powers also have a role to play," he noted after his meeting with Christodoulides.
Subsequently, after the meeting with the Turkish Cypriot leader, Tufan Erhurman highlighted that Guterres "is aware of the firm will of the Turkish Cypriot people to reach a fair and lasting solution."
"We are doing everything possible to fulfill our obligations regarding confidence-building measures. Unlike the experiences of 2004 and 2017, this time we are working with a new and realistic methodology that will contribute to achieving our common goal," Erhurman stated, also emphasizing his support for the UN's efforts.
This is the first time in 16 years that a Secretary-General of the United Nations travels to the island. Guterres is accompanied by the Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, Jean-Pierre Lacroix, and the Under-Secretary-General for Political Affairs and Peacebuilding, Rosemary DiCarlo.
In the delegation also figures the personal envoy of the Secretary-General, María Ángela Holguín, in charge of outlining a new proposal that, according to the British newspaper "The Independent," deviates from the federal scheme that the UN has been defending until now and is oriented towards a model with two entities on equal footing and some shared competencies.
This approach would also include the cession of certain territories by the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the deployment of a small NATO contingent as a guarantor of the agreement, a role currently played by the United Nations in the separation zone between both territories, while trying to foster a rapprochement of positions to make reunification possible.