LEFKOSA - Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) Prime Minister Mehmet Ali Talat, who is heading the TRNC delegation in ongoing Cyprus negotiations in Buergenstock, Switzerland, said on Friday that TRNC delegation did not expect the fourth version of United Nations (U.N.) Secretary General Kofi Annan's plan to be submitted to the parties on Saturday.
Speaking to Turkish Agency-Cyprus (TAK) by phone, Talat denied news that the U.N. presented a binding document to the parties on Thursday evening.
Talat said, ''thousands of documents have been presented and many proposals are laid down. Many issues are being discussed, but any binding document hasn't been presented so far.''
Parties had not started quartet negotiations in Switzerland as expected, but they met at lunch or dinner, Talat noted.
Talat stated that U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan's Special Envoy to Cyprus Alvaro de Soto, U.S. State Department's Special Coordinator for Cyprus Thomas Weston, British High Commissioner in the Greek Cypriot side Lyn Parker and other foreign diplomats conducted intense shuttle diplomacy between parties.
He and other TRNC officials were continuously informing TRNC President Rauf Denktas on the phone, Talat said.
Talat noted that he spoke to Denktas by phone around 11.00 a.m. on Friday and added, ''we don't have any information about whether or not Denktas will come here to join the negotiations.''
TRNC and Greek Cypriot side started Cyprus negotiations in the island on February 19 in order to find a fair and lasting solution to Cyprus issue till May 1 on the basis of Annan plan.
According to Cyprus negotiations road map, two sides were expected to attend a quartet conference together with guarantor powers Turkey and Greece after March 22 to discuss issues on which they could not reach any compromise.
The quartet conference was expected to start in Buergenstock, Switzerland on Wednesday. However, the four-party meeting did not take place among delegations from TRNC, Greek Cypriot side, Turkey and Greece in Buergenstock on the first day of the quartet conference.
Delegations did not hold any bilateral meeting either.
Meetings to be held as a part of the quartet Cyprus conference was limited only with the meeting between Turkish Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Abdullah Gul and his Greek counterpart Petros Moliviatis, and separate meetings between United Nations (U.N.) Secretary General Kofi Annan's Special Envoy to Cyprus Alvaro de Soto with Gul and Moliviatis.
But, the four parties met at dinner on Wednesday night for the first time since 1974. This dinner was considered a ''social event'' rather than a negotiation.
Foreign Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Serdar Denktas of Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) has said that the four-party Cyprus talks would start on Friday evening after the Spring European Council in Brussels.
U.N. Secretary General Annan will fill in the blanks left in the plan if participants can't reach any compromise in quartet meetings, and the text to be formed at the end of all these initiatives will be voted in referenda to be held synchronously in the Turkish and Greek Cypriot sides on April 20.
(BRC-AÖ) 26.03.2004