Cavuşoğlu: “We cannot continue negotiations for a life time”

Turkish foreign Minister Mevlu Cavusoğlu said yesterday that the Cyprus Conference was a final stage of the Cyprus negotiations, and that talks cannot continue for a life time. The minister said, “This should be finalized. If a solution is not reached then the scope of negotiations must change. Then we negotiate for something else.”

Cavusoğlu said that Turkey and the TRNC came to the Conference in order to end the negotiation process by finding a solution, and that they expect the same understanding from the other side.
At a press conference in Crans -Montana, Minister Cavusoğlu said that the Cyprus Conference is not only related to ‘Security and Guarantees’, and that each subject is negotiated in an interrelated way. Cavusoğlu said that they have reiterated many times that they cannot accept zero soldiers and no guarantees.

Answering questions by the press Cavusoğlu added that he does not approve of Eide’s statement that ‘this is the greatest chance, however not the last chance’. He said, “Eide used to say to us that this will be the final conference. He used to say that there is no meaning in continuing after this. In addition, the strategy of carrying on is the Greek Cypriot tactic. They have the elections and they also want to continue unilateral gas explorations in Cyprus. We can see all these strategies therefore if Eide made such a statement we don’t find this to be true.”