AKEL on The Four Steps the Greek Cypriot Side Must Take to Avoid Falling Behind Developments

Article by Stefanos Stefanou – General Secretary of AKEL

28 June 2026 ‘Phileleftheros’ newspaper

 

 

We are at a stage where the UN Secretary-General is exploring the possibility of convening an informal enlarged meeting aimed at breaking the deadlock and resuming negotiations on the Cyprus problem. Antonio Guterres’s intention is to present an outline of positions that will serve as a general framework for the negotiations.

The fact that the UN Secretary-General is taking this initiative is positive , even if it is only a few months before the end of his term of office. We welcome this effort. However, for it to have a chance of succeeding, certain preconditions must be met.

First and foremost, efforts must be made to ensure that the negotiations resume from the point where they were suspended in 2017 at Crans Montana. Consequently, this means that the convergences that have already been recorded must be safeguarded and the negotiations—when and provided that they do resume—must focus on the outstanding issues with the aim of reaching a strategic understanding.

This was the position of the UN Secretary-General for several years after 2017, a position he reiterated in his own statements, as well as in those of his representatives. Mr. Guterres’s position could not have been different, since he himself had assessed that at Crans-Montana we were just one mile—as he characteristically put it—away from reaching a solution, and for that reason he would not want that distance to grow through the reopening or the cancellation of convergences recorded, especially those related to the core of the Cyprus presence.

Furthermore, Mr. Guterres considers it important that the negotiations, when and provided that they commence, proceed within a specific framework that includes all the issues that remain unresolved—which are few in number and concern, primarily, property and the implementation of the solution. This is what he attempted to do with the presentation of his Framework in 2017, and this is what he intends to do now by drawing up an outline, for which he has tasked his Personal Envoy on Cyprus, María Ángela Holguín Cuéllar,, with engaging the parties involved, primarily within the Nicosia-Athens-Ankara triangle.

Against this backdrop, the Greek Cypriot side must prepare adequately so as not to fall behind developments.

What it must do is:

1. Insist on the position for a resumption of the negotiations from the point where they were suspended in 2017 and, consequently, on safeguarding the convergences agreed to date.
2. Request that the UN documents the convergences so that disagreements can be avoided and we do not get bogged down in endless discussions regarding their content. Both sides should know exactly what these convergences are and which issues remain unresolved. Here, the same approach that was successfully applied in 2013 by the then-Special Envoy of the UN Secretary-General, Mr. Downer, can be followed.
3. Without further debate, any attempts to introduce the logic of so-called “new ideas” into agreed-upon issues must be rejected. We emphasize this in light of information circulating widely in diplomatic and journalistic circles that propose changes to the system of government (from a presidential to a parliamentary system), decentralization of the federation, and so on. Discussions about a centralized versus a decentralized federation are unnecessary, since we are no longer at that stage. The powers that define the nature and substance of the federation have already been agreed upon. Any discussion on this matter will not be helpful. On the contrary, it will complicate matters and create new problems. The form of government has also been agreed upon. The Greek Cypriot side advocated—and it was ultimately agreed—for a presidential system after serious reflection, considering the issue of ensuring the stability of the system to be of the utmost importance.
4. There are very few key issues remaining to be discussed and agreed upon: primarily, the property issue and matters concerning transitional arrangements and the implementation of the solution. On the issue—crucial for Greek Cypriots—of the guarantee system, the presence of troops, and the rights of unilateral intervention, at Crans-Montana, as the

The Secretary-General himself has repeatedly noted—consensus had been reached on terminating the Treaty of Guarantee, and thus of the alleged rights of intervention and the withdrawal of the occupying forces, provided that all four internal issues of the Guterres Framework were to be resolved, with political equality—on which full convergence had been achieved—as the crowning achievement.

On this issue, the UN Secretary-General has taken a clear position in favor of abolishing the system of guarantees and replacing it with a mechanism for implementing the solution. He also proposes the withdrawal of the occupying forces within a short period of time, as well as the abolition of any right to unilateral intervention. The insistence of some forces/circles on pushing for the retention of the system of guarantees—indeed with involvement of NATO—diverts us from the position of terminating the guarantee system and makes the situation even worse.

It is AKEL’s conviction that if the sincere political will of all parties is to break the deadlock and achieve a solution, the quickest and most effective way is to safeguard what we have achieved and focus on what remains to be discussed and agreed upon.

Anything else will further complicate the situation and lead us into new dead ends. A roadmap based on this philosophy would be extremely useful in the effort to reach a speedy and positive outcome.