Cyprus and the Security Council’s two meetings for the renewal of UN Peace Keeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) mandate, from the 15 June to 15 December 2007 and from 15 December 2007 until 15 June 2008, are included in a 2007 Security Council round-up.
”The Council held two meetings to extend the mandate of the 43-year-old United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) by adopting resolutions 1758 (2007) and 1789 (2007),” a press release issued by the Security Council on January 4 says.
The press release also recalls that ”in the first of the two texts, the Council noted with concern the lack of progress on the 8 July 2006 Agreement — a set of principles and decisions signed by the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot leaders, which recognized the status quo as unacceptable and a comprehensive settlement as both desirable and possible.”
”The two sides had agreed to immediately begin a two-track process involving technical discussions of issues affecting the day-to-day life of the Cypriot people and, concurrently, consideration by working groups of substantive issues, leading to a comprehensive settlement,” it adds, noting that “the first draft resolution reaffirmed that talks on a final political solution to the Cyprus problem had been at an impasse for too long.”
Regarding its efforts on international peace and security, the Security Council notes that it ”focused intensive efforts on resolving, monitoring and managing a daunting range of complex situations already on its agenda, in concert with the new Secretary-General, developing groundbreaking peacekeeping arrangements and other innovative strategies aimed at strengthening global security.”
”The suffering in Sudan’s Darfur region and elsewhere in Africa, the tragic volatility of the Middle East, final status arrangements in Kosovo and other post-conflict areas, non-proliferation, terrorism, protection of human rights and a host of other difficult issues were the items Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon described as priorities when he addressed the 15-member body for the first time on 8 January,” the press release adds.
As a whole, the Security Council convened 170 public meetings during the year, issuing 50 presidential statements and adopting 56 resolutions, 32 of which concerned Africa.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when Turkey invaded and occupied 37 per cent of its territory. The July 8 2006 agreement was signed by Cyprus President Tassos Papadopoulos and the Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat in the presence of the then UN Undersecretary for Political Affairs Ibrahim Gambari.
