United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has said he will continue his efforts to restart negotiations on reuniting Cyprus, after holding separate meetings on July 28, 2026 with the leaders of the island’s two communities.
Guterres described his talks with Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhürman as productive and said he would keep working towards a settlement. “I will do everything I can to support Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots,” he said.
The trip is the first to Cyprus by a UN secretary-general since Ban Ki-moon travelled there in 2010, and comes with Guterres due to leave office at the end of 2026.
Christodoulides, who received Guterres at his official residence in Nicosia, pressed for results. “We need good news in Cyprus,” he said, adding that his side was counting on the UN chief’s political commitment.
Erhürman told Guterres later in the day that Turkish Cypriots wanted a just and lasting settlement, though he insisted on a different approach from earlier rounds. “We are working on a new and realistic methodology,” he said.
He has ruled out entering another open-ended process without prior agreement on political equality and on the rules governing any negotiation, a condition Greek Cypriot officials have yet to accept.
The three were due to hold a tripartite meeting on July 29 at the UN good offices mission inside the buffer zone that divides Nicosia.
Cypriot government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis said the Greek Cypriot side wanted the current diplomatic activity to produce concrete developments and lead to a broader UN-led conference. Such a meeting would bring together the two Cypriot sides and the island’s three guarantor powers, Greece, Turkey and the United Kingdom.
Negotiations collapsed in 2017 at the Swiss resort of Crans-Montana and have not resumed since. Christodoulides wants to pick up where they broke off, under the UN model of a bizonal, bicommunal federation.
That formula has been rejected in recent years by Ankara, which has demanded recognition of two sovereign states on the island. Erhürman, who won the Turkish Cypriot presidency in October 2025 on a pro-federation platform, has broken with his predecessor Ersin Tatar on that point while stressing that relations with Turkey remain vital.
Cypriot media have reported that the UN has assembled a set of ideas intended to bridge the gap between the sides, though UN officials have denied that a completed plan exists.
Cyprus joined the European Union in 2004 with its northern third under Turkish military control, and EU law remains suspended there. The dispute continues to weigh on Turkey’s relations with Brussels and on ties between the NATO allies Greece and Turkey.
