Cyprus problem talks get off ground

The Greek Cypriot and the Turkish Cypriot sides exchanged lists of issues to be discussed concerning the substance of the Cyprus problem, in accordance with the agreement reached on 8 July 2006 between the leaders of the two communities in Cyprus in the presence of UN Undersecretary General for political affairs Ibrahim Gambari.

An official press release says that the issues of substance will be discussed and examined by teams of experts on a bicommunal level.

The lists were exchanged by the representatives of the leaders of the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot communities, Tasos Tzionis and Rasit Pertev respectively, in the presence and at the residence of Special Representative of the UN Secretary General in Nicosia Michael Moller, in the Nicosia UN buffer zone.

‘Moller, Tzionis and Pertev will continue their meetings in the next days, with a view to promote the implementation of the agreement (reached on July 8th) that provides for the establishment of bicommunal working teams of experts for the discussion of issues of substance of the Cyprus problem, as well as for the establishment of bicommunal technical committees for the discussion of practical day-to-day issues,’ the press release says.

It adds that ‘the Confidence Building Measures will be discussed, in parallel, in accordance with the standard practice, by making use of the good offices of the United Nations Peacekeeping force in Cyprus (UNFICYP).’

On July 8th, Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos and Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat met in the presence of Gambari and agreed to begin a process of bicommunal discussions on issues that affect the day-to-day life of the people and concurrently those that concern substantive issues.

The agreement states that ‘the Technical Committees on issues that affect the day-to-day life of people will commence by the end of July provided that, at the same time, the two leaders will also have exchanged a list of issues of substance and its contents to be studied by expert bicommunal working groups and finalised by the leaders.’