LARNACA (AFP) - Cypriot Foreign Minister George
Iacovou left yesterday for the United States where he will urge UN chief
Kofi Annan and senior US officials to pressure Turkey over ending the
island’s division.
“We want to stress the fact that attempts to achieve a
Cyprus solution have failed because of Turkish intransigence,” Iacovou
said, adding that efforts to pressure Turkey over Cyprus were made
“difficult” because “there is a crisis between the military and
political leadership” in Ankara.
Also high on Iacovou’s agenda in the US will be plans
for the period leading up to Cyprus becoming an EU member in May 2004.
Following the failure in March of Greek and Turkish
Cypriots to reach a deal on a UN blueprint for reunification, efforts to
relaunch intercommunal talks have apparently been sidelined by the
international players.
Iacovou will meet with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan
and his special representative for Cyprus, Alvaro de Soto, before
seeing US Secretary of State Colin Powell, Vice President Dick Cheney
and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Cypriot officials said."