By Merve Aydogan
HAMILTON, Canada (AA) - The UN announced on Monday it would hold informal consultations in October between the island’s Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot sides.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres had separate bilateral meetings with Ersin Tatar, president of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), and Nikos Christodoulides, the Greek Cypriot administration leader, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told a news conference.
Guterres invited both parties for informal consultations next month, Dujarric said, adding that the consultations would discuss the path forward on the Cyprus issue.
"We're glad to report both leaders have accepted his invitation," Dujarric said, adding that the consultations over the Mediterranean island would likely take place in New York.
- Decades-long dispute
The island of Cyprus has been mired in a decades-long dispute between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, despite a series of diplomatic efforts to achieve a comprehensive settlement.
Ethnic attacks starting in the early 1960s forced Turkish Cypriots to withdraw into enclaves for their safety.
In 1974, a Greek Cypriot coup aimed at Greece’s annexation of the island led to Türkiye's military intervention as a guarantor power to protect Turkish Cypriots from persecution and violence. As a result, the TRNC was founded in 1983.
The Greek Cypriot administration was admitted to the European Union in 2004, the same year Greek Cypriots thwarted a UN plan to end the longstanding dispute.
Türkiye fully supports a two-state solution on the island of Cyprus based on sovereign equality and equal international status.