Negotiators to meet on Thursday ahead of leaders’ meeting

Greek Cypriot chief negotiator Menelaos Menelaou and Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman’s undersecretary Mehmet Dana are to meet on Thursday, according to reports on Tuesday. According to the Cyprus News Agency, the meeting will take place at 11am, and will be convened with the aim of preparing for next week’s meeting of Erhurman and President Nikos Christodoulides. Earlier, government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis had promised that Christodoulides will approach that meeting with a “constructive attitude”, with it hoped that next week’s meeting will constitute a step towards the convening of an enlarged meeting on the Cyprus problem. That meeting will involve the island’s two sides, its three guarantor powers, Greece, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, and the United Nations. Related Articles • Foreign ministry tells embassies to stay away from Dana Cyprus problem briefing • Menelaou says Turkish side is ‘slowing down developments’ on Cyprus problem • Holguin: Confidence-building measures an ‘indispensable condition’ for enlarged meeting • Letymbiotis hails ‘return to substance of Cyprus problem’ • Fidan: Greek Cypriot side will never agree to power-sharing • Guterres’ roadmap aims for ‘serious process’ on Cyprus problem, Dana says During his visit to the island last month, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said that such a meeting, , will be convened “after adequate progress” is achieved on confidence-building measures, the meeting’s methodology, and the substance of the talks. Initially, presidential press office director Victor Papadopoulos had said that while confidence-building measures “naturally help create a climate”, they are “not a prerequisite” for an enlarged meeting to be convened. However, UN Cyprus problem envoy Maria Angela Holguin then pushed back on this, saying that the implementation of confidence-building measures is an “indispensable condition” to be fulfilled ahead of an enlarged meeting. “Confidence-building measures should not be seen merely as symbolic steps which improve the atmosphere between the two communities, but rather as practical tools which test the viability of a future political order,” she told Turkey’s Anka news agency. She added that confidence-building measures are “important in demonstrating whether cooperation works in practice”, and said that “such initiatives help create the collaborative habits which a future solution will need”. Chief among those possible confidence-building measures is the possible opening of crossing points between the island’s two sides, on which talks remained deadlocked over the question of whether to break up the package of four locations upon which the sides had agreed last year. On this matter, the Greek Cypriot side proposed removing Louroujina, northwest of Larnaca, from the package of four, instead opening crossing points near Athienou, and in the eastern Nicosia suburbs of Mia Milia and Aglandjia, and the Turkish Cypriot side flatly refused to entertain any discussions which did not include all four agreed upon locations.