Vice President Fuat Oktay said on Thursday that the time has come to recognize the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), highlighting that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan called for the whole world to endorse its legitimacy at the United Nations in recent months.

Oktay evaluated Türkiye's efforts for the recognition of the TRNC while appearing in a live broadcast.

"Our stance here is very clear. With the call of our president at the U.N., we have reached another phase in our policies toward the TRNC. Now it is time for the world to recognize the TRNC," the Turkish vice president said.

Calling the TRNC an indispensable part of Türkiye's Eastern Mediterranean policy, Oktay stressed, "It is an indispensable condition for Türkiye's security, but it is also an indispensable condition for the TRNC's security. In other words, we are talking about an equation in which there would be no Türkiye without the TRNC and no TRNC without Türkiye. "

Oktay also drew attention to the fact that although the Turkish Cypriots agreed to all the proposed solutions when it comes to the Cyprus issue, no result could be reached, adding that the only solution that remains is one based on two sovereign equal states.

In addition, one of the main topics on the agenda during President Erdoğan's trip to Samarkand, Uzbekistan will be the TRNC obtaining observer status at the ninth summit of the Organization of Turkic States (OTS), Oktay said, adding that they wish to achieve this result.

The island of Cyprus has been mired in a decadeslong struggle between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, despite a series of diplomatic efforts by the U.N. to achieve a comprehensive settlement. Five decades of Cyprus talks have yielded no results.

The island has been divided since 1964 when ethnic attacks forced the Turkish Cypriots to retreat into enclaves for their safety. In 1974, a Greek Cypriot coup aiming at Greece's annexation led to Turkey's military intervention as a guarantor power. The TRNC was founded in 1983.

The Greek Cypriot administration, backed by Greece, became a member of the European Union in 2004, although in a referendum that year most Greek Cypriots rejected a United Nations settlement plan that envisaged a reunited Cyprus joining the bloc.