Greece tells UN to restart Cyprus talks

Greek Foreign Minister Petros Molyviatis said after meeting UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Monday that "everybody now agrees" that reunification talks for the divided Mediterranean island should be re-launched.

Although Molyviatis did not name them, the four parties holding the key to fresh talks are the Turkish Cypriot north, the Greek Cypriot south, Greece and Turkey.

"We expressed the view that there is a convergence now of views to the effect that we should restart the process of reunifying the island on the basis of the secretary-general’s plan," Molyviatis said at the UN headquarters after talks with Annan.

"And we should make sure that this time there is no failure. We cannot afford another failure."

Public call

Annan had no immediate comment on their meeting.

Molyviatis spoke 11 days after Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos publicly called on the United Nations to restart talks on resolving the island’s ethnic partition.

Cyprus has been divided into a Turkish Cypriot north, recognised only by Turkey, and an internationally recognised Greek Cypriot south since a Turkish invasion to save Turks in 1974, triggered by a Greek-inspired coup.

In twin referendums held in April 2004, Turkish Cypriots voted to accept Annan’s blueprint for ending more than three decades of partition on the divided Mediterranean island, but their richer and more numerous Greek counterparts rejected it.