UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Monday revealed his latest -- and likely final -- plan for the reunification of Cyprus, promising all sides a "win-win" deal.
The 220-page document -- accompanied by 9,000 pages of annexes -- was handed to the parties at a ceremony in the mountain resort of Buergenstock.
"There is a sense of destiny today. You are here to give a final push to the effort to solve the Cyprus problem once and for all," Annan told negotiators.
PHOTO: AP
"I believe this is a win-win proposal," Annan added.
The plan is aimed at clinching a deal that will satisfy both sides before Cyprus joins the EU on May 1. Exact details have not been released by the UN, but the sides at the negotiations revealed the main points.
The Turkish delegation appeared more supportive of the plan, but the Greek delegation expressed immediate reservations.
"From the first reading, we can say that there are some clear concerns," said Theodoros Roussopoulos, a spokesman for the Greek foreign minister.
Kypros Chrysostomides, spokesman for the Greek Cypriot government, said later, "Some of the points are satisfactory, but some of the basic points for our side are not. Some of the issues which are very important for us were given to the other side."
He said the Greek Cypriots would continue to try to amend the plan.
According to officials at the talks, the plan sets conditions that ensure that the Turkish Cypriot region in the north will be run by Turkish Cypriots even when Greek Cypriots have returned to the region.
It also reduces the number of Greek Cypriot refugees allowed to return and settle in the northern part of the island to 18 percent of the Turkish Cypriot population from 21 percent in the previous proposal.
Cyprus has been split into the Greek Cypriot-controlled south and the occupied north since Turkey invaded in 1974 in the wake of a short-lived coup by supporters of union with Greece. The breakaway state is only recognized by Turkey, which maintains 40,000 troops there.
TIT-FOR-TAT: The arrest of Filipinos that Manila said were in China as part of a scholarship program follows the Philippines’ detention of at least a dozen Chinese The Philippines yesterday expressed alarm over the arrest of three Filipinos in China on suspicion of espionage, saying they were ordinary citizens and the arrests could be retaliation for Manila’s crackdown against alleged Chinese spies. Chinese authorities arrested the Filipinos and accused them of working for the Philippine National Security Council to gather classified information on its military, the state-run China Daily reported earlier this week, citing state security officials. It said the three had confessed to the crime. The National Security Council disputed Beijing’s accusations, saying the three were former recipients of a government scholarship program created under an agreement between the
Sitting around a wrestling ring, churchgoers roared as local hero Billy O’Keeffe body-slammed a fighter named Disciple. Beneath stained-glass windows, they whooped and cheered as burly, tattooed wresters tumbled into the aisle during a six-man tag-team battle. This is Wrestling Church, which brings blood, sweat and tears — mostly sweat — to St Peter’s Anglican church in the northern England town of Shipley. It is the creation of Gareth Thompson, a charismatic 37-year-old who said he was saved by pro wrestling and Jesus — and wants others to have the same experience. The outsized characters and scripted morality battles of pro wrestling fit
ACCESS DISPUTE: The blast struck a house, and set cars and tractors alight, with the fires wrecking several other structures and cutting electricity An explosion killed at least five people, including a pregnant woman and a one-year-old, during a standoff between rival groups of gold miners early on Thursday in northwestern Bolivia, police said, a rare instance of a territorial dispute between the nation’s mining cooperatives turning fatal. The blast thundered through the Yani mining camp as two rival mining groups disputed access to the gold mine near the mountain town of Sorata, about 150km northwest of the country’s administrative capital of La Paz, said Colonel Gunther Agudo, a local police officer. Several gold deposits straddle the remote area. Agudo had initially reported six people killed,
SUSPICION: Junta leader Min Aung Hlaing returned to protests after attending a summit at which he promised to hold ‘free and fair’ elections, which critics derided as a sham The death toll from a major earthquake in Myanmar has risen to more than 3,300, state media said yesterday, as the UN aid chief made a renewed call for the world to help the disaster-struck nation. The quake on Friday last week flattened buildings and destroyed infrastructure across the country, resulting in 3,354 deaths and 4,508 people injured, with 220 others missing, new figures published by state media showed. More than one week after the disaster, many people in the country are still without shelter, either forced to sleep outdoors because their homes were destroyed or wary of further collapses. A UN estimate
RSS