The Secretary-General of the United Nations has announced the appointment of Maria Ángela Holguin Cuéllar, former Foreign Minister of Colombia, as his Personal Envoy on Cyprus.

Türkiye and the Turkish Cypriot side have given their consent to the said appointment on two conditions. The first is that the mandate of the Personal Envoy shall be limited to exploring whether common ground exists or not between the two sides on the Island for the start of new, formal settlement negotiations. The second is that the duration of the Personal Envoy’s mandate shall not exceed six months. The President of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, H.E. Mr. Tatar, has also underlined these two points.

Actually, the fact that there is no common ground between the two sides on the Island is also stated in the reports of the UN Secretary-General. It is abundantly clear that the federal solution model, which has been repeatedly negotiated for more than half a century and has never been realized due to the intransigent attitude of the Greek Cypriot side, is outdated and exhausted. From now on, the indispensable precondition for the start of any new negotiation process in Cyprus is the reaffirmation of the sovereign equality and equal international status of the Turkish Cypriot people. Reaching a common ground between the two sides will therefore only be possible within the framework of this understanding. Embarking yet again on a process seeking a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation, whose life has expired, is out of the question.

This being the case, it is clear that the six-month mandate of the Personal Envoy will be more than sufficient to ascertain, without leaving any room for misunderstanding, whether common ground exists or not between the two sides on the Island to start new, formal settlement negotiations.

We wish the Personal Envoy, Ms. Holguin Cuéllar, success in her new assignment. We emphasize our expectation that her report will objectively reflect the positions of the sides and the realities on the Island, draw the necessary conclusions and put on record which realistic future course of action could be followed based on these conclusions.