US accuses Greeks for manipulating the vote

Voters on the richer, southern part of Cyprus resisted international pressure, including from the United States, and overwhelmingly followed their Greek Cypriot leaders’ calls to vote "no."

The referendum means the Greek Cypriot area alone enters the European Union on Saturday but the U.S. criticism — and similar EU disapproval — means it does so under a cloud.

"We do think that there was a lot of manipulation by the Greek-Cypriot leaders in the run-up to the election; that the outcome was regrettable but not surprising given those actions," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said.

"There was restrictions on the press … that limited full coverage of foreigners’ statements on the U.N. settlement," Boucher said. "Teachers were instructed to encourage their students to vote no. And students were provided with ‘No’ banners and T-shirts by their teachers."

The United States sought to improve the chances of its ally Turkey’s own chances of entering the EU through a "yes" vote and lobbied Cypriots hard to accept the U.N.-proposed peace plan.

The EU has praised Turkey — the only country that recognizes the Turkish Cypriot area — for working to reunite the island to try to avoid the bloc inheriting the decades-old territorial dispute.

U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell held out the possibility of U.S. aid to Turkish Cypriots.

"Obviously we were disappointed. We believe an important opportunity, a historic opportunity was lost," Powell said.

"They (the EU) will continue to provide assistance to Turkish Cypriots. We are reviewing our position and will also be reviewing the actions of the European Union to make sure that we are operating in a way that is consistent with our European colleagues," he added.