Brussels, Belgium. United Nations envoy Maria Angela Holguin will travel to Brussels and Ankara ahead of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ visit to Cyprus next week.
Holguin is due to meet European Commission Cyprus problem envoy Raffaele Fitto in Brussels on Wednesday and is also expected to meet European Council President Antonio Costa.
Meetings in Brussels and Ankara
After Brussels, Holguin will travel to Ankara, where she is expected to meet Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Friday.
Turkey’s Anka news agency reported that the meeting is expected to assess the recent acceleration of diplomatic contacts on Cyprus, the positions of the sides and issues planned for discussion during Guterres’ visit.
Guterres’ Cyprus programme
Guterres will arrive in Cyprus next Monday. He is scheduled to hold an informal evening meal with President Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman on Monday.
On Tuesday morning, Guterres will hold separate meetings with Christodoulides and Erhurman at their official residences, beginning with Christodoulides. He will later visit the Committee on Missing Persons.
A tripartite meeting involving Guterres and the two leaders is scheduled for Wednesday.
Efforts to resume negotiations
The visits by Holguin and Guterres come as efforts in Cyprus and abroad intensify to resume negotiations on the Cyprus problem.
Holguin’s return to the island will partly focus on efforts to convene an enlarged meeting on the Cyprus problem this summer. Such a meeting would involve the island’s two sides, the three guarantor powers—Greece, Turkey and the United Kingdom—and the UN.
Both Cypriot leaders have said the meeting would not be an end in itself. In a July 20 anniversary speech on Monday, Erhurman said he did not want negotiations or a five-plus-one meeting for their own sake and that the process should be result-oriented.