-
.
- Ελληνικά
The President of the Republic Mr. Nicos Christodoulides visited today together with the Turkish Cypriot leader Mr. Ersin Tatar the CMP Anthropological Laboratory, where during the visit they made statements to the media.
In his statements to journalists at the ICRC's Anthropological Laboratory, the President of the Republic said, among other things, that the issue of the missing persons "is a humanitarian issue, it does not matter whether you are a Greek Cypriot or a Turkish Cypriot, we are talking about people.
And we are here with Ersin, who I am sure is sensitive to the issue, since his father was the Turkish Cypriot member of the CMP for 21 years, to send a message to all Cypriots, Greek and Turkish Cypriots, to work together, to give us information. We need to speed up the excellent work that the CMP is doing, the excellent work that the scientists, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, are doing, so that we can put an end to this issue. The relatives have been waiting for so many years, you understand the pain.
I am here to look at any way that we can have more teams that the ICRC can use to speed up the process on this purely humanitarian issue, on which, if we strengthen our cooperation, we will send a message to the Cypriot people about the need to work together."
He added that "we are discussing some ideas to speed up the process" and noted that the issue of further EU funding for the ICJ's excellent work will be considered, as it is the Commission's number one funder.
"I know that funding is very important, which is why I stressed the need to have more teams working, because it is a pity to have information and not enough teams to investigate it," the President said, adding: "The issue will be discussed by our two Members in the CMP who will make recommendations on which we will decide together with Mr. Tatar."
Noting the excellent work of the CMP, the President underlined the commitment of the parties to encourage the public to provide information on the missing persons, expressed the hope to meet again soon with Mr. Tatar, adding: "We will assess progress after our visit here."
Although, during the remarks, Mr. Tatar indicated that he would not accept a resumption of Cyprus talks unless his out-of-context positions on Cyprus were accepted, the President said: "We are here on a purely humanitarian issue, we need first of all to respect the relatives of the missing, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, so I will not enter into any discussion regarding the resumption of talks."
I am doing what is possible, what is necessary and I hope that soon, if possible at the end of September, we will have something to announce.
We are here for the issue of the missing persons and to send positive common messages to the Cypriots", the President of the Republic concluded.
(PM/AF/EXP)
Contents of this article including associated images are owned by PIO
Views & opinions expressed are those of the author and/or PIO
Source
