United Nations secretary general Antonio Guterres invited Greek Cypriot president Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci to a working dinner at the world body's NY headquarters on Sunday night, seeking to break an impasse over how a summit aiming for a reunification deal should proceed.
Following a meeting with the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot leaders, United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres announced that they had agreed on the need to reconvene the Conference on Cyprus in June, in line with the 12 January statement of the conference.
Turkish Cypriot President Mustafa Akinci on Monday announced progress towards a Geneva peace conference in June for a "win-win" on the divided island.
Guterres invited Greek Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci to a working dinner at United Nations headquarters to try and break an impasse.
Greek Cypriots perceive their ongoing presence post-settlement a threat, while Turkish Cypriots say the troops are necessary for their security.
Cyprus was split into a Greek Cypriot south and a Turkish Cypriot north in 1974 when Turkey sent troops to the eastern Mediterranean island after a coup engineered by the military rulers of Greece.
Prior to the meeting, Akıncı told reporters the objective of Sunday's meeting was to "discuss the bottleneck created by the other side's persistent preconditions".
Both sides have agreed on most of the issues in the reunification deal, but the sticking points, including a security and guarantees system, remain unresolved.
He said his special adviser on Cyprus, Espen Barth Eide, will engage with all participants "in preparation of the common documents to guide discussions on security and guarantees".
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"What we need from now on is political will and determination, more than ever", said Akinci.
Guterres did not announce a date for the reconvened Geneva Conference on Cyprus, but Greek Cypriot sources in NY estimated that this would be during the last 10 days of June.
French energy company Total is set to start exploratory drilling in one licensed area, or block, in mid-July.
Turkey and the Turkish Cypriots are ready to take part in a summit in Geneva to work out a peace accord reunifying ethnically divided Cyprus as long as Greek Cypriots drop unacceptable "conditions", Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Thursday.
Akinci had asked Anastasiades to suspend drilling.
The UN chief and the leaders also agreed that all issues will be negotiated interdependently, as per the joint declaration of 11 February 2014.
Mr Guterres smiled broadly but the two leaders did not.
Mr Anastasiades told reporters he did not come to the United Nations "for a blame game".
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