Turkish Cypriot Leader Says Does Not Expect Progress on Settlement Issue After Elections

UNITED NATIONS, (Sputnik) - Turkish Cypriot President Ersin Tatar on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly told Sputnik that he does not foresee any progress on the settlement issue after the upcoming elections in Cyprus are completed.

"There are three people who are running for the presidency [in 2023] - they are all students of [Cyprus President Nicos] Anastasiades," he said. "If you look at their CVs, they all came from the same background as Anastasiades. Therefore, I don’t expect anything to develop after the election because their election campaign is [run] more on nationalism. In fact, they are competing with each other who is more radical and I expect the more radical one to win the election."

In April, Cypriot diplomat Menelaos Menelaou became the new chief negotiator of Greek Cypriots on the Cyprus issue, replacing Andreas Mavroyiannis. In June, Anastasiades met with his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on the sidelines of the NATO summit in Madrid and expressed his readiness to resume UN-brokered negotiations on Cyprus.

Tatar said his special representative does meet the envoy in Cyprus often, but no official talks are underway.

"We have no serious formal negotiations on the table," he said. "We are doing other work through the technical committees."

Northern Cyprus, he added, will not agree to negotiations until Cyprus recognizes their sovereign equality.

"What Mr. Erdogan hinted in Madrid is our common policy, that we will only start to resume to talk seriously in a formal manner... if and when the Greek Cypriots accept... Turkish sovereign equality," Tatar said. "This is very important for us."

Tatar said they have to protect themselves while being constructive and forward-looking.

"Greek Cyprus, I don't want to call them my enemies... because I respect their obvious fight for themselves," Tatar stated. "However, I expect them to respect me also, if they respect me, they should recognize the facts... there are two peoples - Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots. So we somehow have to reconcile this."

Under any agreement, Turkish Cypriots will insist Ankara's guarantee continues and some Turkish troops remain on the island as safeguards for their security, Tatar added.

"Otherwise, we will not be definitely feeling secure, because we will again be potentially attacked," he said.

Gas Well Discovered Offshore Cyprus Should Be Shared

In August, the French energy company TotalEnergies and the Italian oil and gas company Eni announced a natural gas discovery at the Cronos-1 well offshore Cyprus. According to preliminary estimates, there are about 2.5 TCF of gas in place.

"We should be acting together, we should be involved in the activities, we should also be involved in committees to formally negotiate the sharing of the resources between the government, Cyprus and the companies, oil companies," Tatar said. "But unfortunately, they are not giving us an opportunity because their policies that Cyprus belong to the Cyprus government. They see themselves as masters of the land. We are co-owners of that."

Climate Action and Energy spokesperson Tim McPhie said in August that it was still premature for the European Commission to comment on Cyprus' announcement related to the well given that the issue needs further exploration and analysis.

Meanwhile, Cypriot Energy Minister Natasa Pilides said that the discovery could help secure gas supplies to Europe amid the energy crisis.

The island of Cyprus has been split since 1974 between Greek Cypriots, who represent the island nation in the European Union, and Turkish Cypriots, who are recognized by Turkey.