LEFKOSA, Jan 31 (A.A) - President Rauf Denktas of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) and Greek Cypriot administration leader Glafcos Clerides came together on Thursday for the seventh time except their weekly programme in the process of direct talks which started on January 16 and aimed to find a lasting solution to the Cyprus issue.
When asked whether or not ''they would discuss the structure'' by reporters while he was leaving his office for the seventh meeting, Denktas said that they would not say what they were discussing.
The meeting in which U.N. Secretary General's Special Envoy to Cyprus Alvaro De Soto is attending as an observer is being held at the ''Lefkosa Conference Center'' which is in the U.N.-controlled buffer zone. Delegations are accompanying each of the leaders in the meeting.
His Undersecretary Ergun Olgun, TRNC Foreign and Defense Ministry Undersecretary Resat Caglar, his advisor Prof. Dr. Mumtaz Soysal for constitutional and legal matters and rapporteur Seniha Birand are accompanying Denktas.
During their meeting on January 28, the two leaders decided to meet also today in order to ''work more and accelerate talks'', increasing the number of meetings to four this week.
Denktas and Clerides will meet again at 17:00 on Friday.
When asked why they had felt the need for an ''extra'' meeting after yesterday's talk, Denktas said that they put aside the matter of structure while discussing the functions, adding, ''we saw that discussion on non-structural function was not coming to a conclusion, so we agreed on it as a remedy to bring them together.''
TRNC PRESIDENT DENKTAS SAYS BOTH SIDES IN CYPRUS HAVE TO FOUND PARTNERSHIP BASED ON MUTUAL RESPECT
Rauf Denktas, the President of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) said on Thursday that what is important for the external world is to see that both sides can found a partnership based on mutual respect.
Responding to questions of journalists, Denktas quoted the words of a foreign professor who had said that ''rigid rules about Cyprus have to be left aside and the issues must be sorted out by taking into consideration the realities.''
''If one side does not see and recognize the other one and if it tells that the other side is not sovereign as its population decreased to nine percent and its territory decreased to 5 percent, this is unacceptable. We are here, there are both Greek and Turkish Cypriots on the island. There was a republic on the island in the past and it belonged to both sides. The two sides could not live together and they were divided into two. Now the practical way for them to come together is not fighting. The two sides must tell each other that both of them exist on the island and they don't have the right to govern the other side. This means that the thing that matters for the external world is to see the establishment of a partnership between the two sides that respect each other. If we can do that, we will reach success,'' he added.