The Cyprus issue has been ongoing for half a century and there is no hurry to find a solution, Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) President Ersin Tatar said Tuesday reiterating that an agreement on a federal basis will no longer yield results on the island.
Tatar said Tuesday that he held a bilateral meeting with United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Sept. 25 in which they discussed in detail the possibility of an agreement in Cyprus with the cooperation of the two states living side by side.
Speaking at a press conference at Ercan International Airport in Nicosia (Lefkoşa) on his return from his trip to New York at the invitation of Guterres, Tatar said he followed the 76th U.N. General Assembly and attended the opening of the Turkish House (Türkevi), located across the U.N. headquarters.
"The Cyprus issue has been going on for half a century. I am in no hurry. I never said that 'I will finish this job in three months' like previous presidents. My position is the sovereignty and state policy put forward by our founding President Rauf Raif Denktaş," he said.
Noting that it is very important to be able to talk about two states in Cyprus, Tatar said an agreement on a federal basis will no longer yield results.
Underlining that in his speech at the General Assembly, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan also declared his support for the Turkish Cypriots' new policy, a two-state solution on the basis of sovereign equality, Tatar stressed that this declaration gives them strength.
He added that he will inform the party leaders in the TRNC, the Cabinet and Parliament about his contacts in New York.
Negotiations to solve the decadeslong Cyprus problem will not start unless those talks take into consideration the sovereign equality and international status of the TRNC, Tatar had said following a meeting with Greek Cypriot administration leader Nicos Anastasiades and U.N. Secretary-General Guterres in New York on Monday.
While Greece and the Greek Cypriot administration support a federation on Cyprus, Turkey and the TRNC insist on a two-state solution reflecting the realities on the island.
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 led nowhere.
The island has been divided since 1964, when ethnic attacks forced Turkish Cypriots to withdraw into enclaves for their safety. In 1974, a Greek Cypriot coup aiming at annexation by Greece 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, even though in a referendum that year most Greek Cypriots rejected a U.N. settlement plan that envisaged a reunited Cyprus joining the EU.