Annan seeks end to Turkish Cypriot isolation

A report by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan on his failed Cyprus peace plan calls for an end to the Turkish Cypriots' international isolation, a Turkish Cypriot daily said yesterday.

The respected Halkin Sesi newspaper said Mr Annan's report, to be released this week, praised the Turkish Cypriots and Turkey for backing his plan to reunite the divided island while criticising Greek Cypriots for setting back reunification.

UN officials said the report was unfinished and had not yet been released. The Cyprus government was upset the report had found its way into a Turkish Cypriot daily, a diplomat at the Cyprus UN mission said in New York.

Separately, a second Annan report, dealing with the 40-year-old UN peacekeeping mission in Cyprus, asked the council for a six-month renewal of the mission's mandate, which set to expire in mid-June.

But Mr Annan intends to review all UN peace activities in Cyprus and issue recommendations on any adjustments or restructuring within three months, that report said.

The UN peacekeepers on the island enforce a longtime cease-fire and monitor a buffer zone between the Turkish Cypriot north and the Greek Cypriot south.

The situation has been calm along the border in recent months and 3.7 million crossings have taken place since the Turkish Cypriots opened several crossing points between the two zones in April 2003, Mr Annan's report said.

Cyprus has been split since Turkish troops invaded the north in 1974 after a brief Greek Cypriot coup engineered by the military junta then ruling Greece. While the Greek Cypriot government in the south is internationally recognised, only Turkey recognises the breakaway statelet in the north.

Mr Annan's unreleased report is expected to serve as a benchmark for how the international community should deal with the north after it voted "yes" on the UN plan for reunifying the island while the Greek Cypriot south voted "no."

"I would hope the members of the (UN Security) Council can give a strong lead to all states to cooperate both bilaterally and in international bodies to eliminate unnecessary restrictions and barriers that have the effect of isolating the Turkish Cypriots," the newspaper quoted his report as saying.

Turkish Cypriots have been under an international trade embargo for decades which has hamstrung their economy and left them much poorer than their Greek Cypriot neighbors.