New Ideas Promised For Cyprus Talks

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan promised new ideas Wednesday for ending the decades-old division of Cyprus and called on leaders of the island’s rival communities to demonstrate a desire to end the strife.

“I invited the leaders of the Cypriot communities to meet here for face-to-face talks because I believe that a lasting peace in Cyprus is now within our grasp,” Annan said during brief opening ceremonies for five days of talks at Troutbeck, a rural, wooded retreat 90 miles north of New York City.

But, Annan added, the consequences of failure “are likely to be more dire than at any time in recent decades.”

Afterward, Greek Cypriot President Glafkos Clerides and Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash lunched together and then held a closed meeting with U.N. negotiator Diego Cordovez. Sources close to the talks, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the first meeting was devoted mostly to procedural matters.

The talks are the first in nearly three years between the leaders of the eastern Mediterranean island. Cyprus has been split since 1974, when Turkey sent in troops to protect the Turkish minority after a failed coup by Greek Cypriots seeking union with Greece. About 1,200 U.N. troops patrol the 112-mile buffer between the two communities.