Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Thursday that the most realistic way to break the political deadlock over Cyprus is a two-state arrangement on the ethnically divided island.
Erdogan spoke alongside Tufan Erhurman, the newly elected Turkish Cypriot leader, who has pledged to explore a federal solution — long backed by the United Nations — to end nearly 50 years of division on the island.
Turkey is the only country that recognizes the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Erdogan and former Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar have supported a two-state policy, which Greek Cypriots have rejected.
“The Greek Cypriot side sees the solution for Cyprus as reducing Turkish Cypriots to a minority in a partnership state that is now defunct,” Erdogan said, adding he still believed there was “a formula” that would allow both sides to live peacefully on the island.
Erhurman, making his first foreign trip to Turkey as tradition dictates, said all parties must “learn a lesson” from previous attempts to resolve the conflict.
“The Turkish Cypriot people are one of the two founding partners of the island, and this status is not open to debate, negotiation or bargaining,” he said, referring also to claims over energy and hydrocarbon resources. “Nobody should expect us to walk a path that has been tried many times and led nowhere.”
Cyprus was split in 1974 after a Turkish invasion triggered by a brief Greek-backed coup, following years of tension that began after the collapse of a power-sharing agreement in 1963. Formal reunification talks have been stalled since 2017.