LEFKOSA - President Rauf Denktas of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) has said that Greek Cypriot leader Tassos Papadopoulos asked for additional time to work on the document of changes that the TRNC had presented the day before with the pretext that it exceeded the framework of Annan's plan so talks would continue on Thursday.
Denktas returned nearly ten minutes after he left the Presidential Office for the buffer zone on Wednesday and made a statement to reporters.
Noting that they had presented a document on the changes that they envisaged in Annan's plan the day before, Denktas said that U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan's Special Envoy to Cyprus Alvaro De Soto had telephoned him while he was on his way to the buffer zone.
''De Soto told us that Papadopoulos had telephoned him and said the document was out of the frame of Annan's plan so they wanted to work on it,'' Denktas said.
Denktas added that today's session of talks was cancelled and talks would continue on Thursday.
(MS-AÖ) 25.02.2004