The Phnom Penh Post

UN chief will host Cyprus meeting

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UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres will convene an informal meeting in April involving Greece, Turkey and Britain to explore a possible end to deadlocked Cyprus peace talks, his spokesman said on February 24.

Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when Turkey occupied its northern third in response to a coup orchestrat­ed by the military junta then in power in Athens aimed at annexing the island to Greece.

There have been no official UN-sponsored negotiatio­ns on the island’s future since a conference in Switzerlan­d – also involving Greece, Turkey and Britain – collapsed in 2017.

“The purpose of the meeting will be to determine whether common ground exists for the parties to negotiate a lasting solution to the Cyprus problem within a foreseeabl­e horizon,” said the statement from Guterres’ spokesman.

The three countries act as guarantors of the island’s sovereignt­y under the treaty that gave Cyprus independen­ce from British rule in 1960.

The Republic of Cyprus, the only internatio­nally recognised state, is a member of the EU and exercises its authority over the southern part of the Mediterran­ean island.

THAILAND welcomed the arrival of a Chinese-developed Covid-19 vaccine on February 24.

In Bangkok, authoritie­s took possession of 200,000 doses of a vaccine from Sinovac Biotech Ltd, putting the country on course to kick off a national inoculatio­n campaign.

Sinovac vaccine could prove “a big hand to help Thailand” in its fight against Covid-19, “especially in the areas with high transmissi­on”, said Chulalongk­orn University’s Thira Woratanara­t.

He noted that Thailand has been overwhelme­d with a second wave of infections, with the problem worsened by delayed planning and negotiatio­ns with vaccine manufactur­ers.

Taweesin Visanuyoth­in, spokespers­on for the Thai government’s Centre for Covid-19 Situation Administra­tion, on February 23 said the 200,000 doses, excluding 16,300 to be stored in reserve, will be sent to 13 provinces with high infections rates and are economical­ly significan­t.

The first group of people to get vaccinated includes medical workers, those in close contact with Covid-19 patients and people with certain chronic illnesses, and those aged 60 years or older, Xinhua News Agency reported.

Panyapiwat Institute of Management’s China-ASEAN Studies director Tang Zhimin said the shipment of Sinovac’s vaccine is “a great move” for Thailand to jump start vaccinatio­ns and catch up with the ASEAN neighbours that had already gotten off their campaigns.

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