Moment of truth

It has been extremely encouraging to note the talks taking place in Geneva to end the partition of Cyprus between the predominantly Turkish north and Greek south, so that the whole island has a unified – if federated – political structure.

At present only the south is recognised by the EU, and UN troops oversee a buffer zone across the island. Any agreement would have to be sanctioned by the UN and put to a referendum on both sides of the island, probably in the late spring.

We have, of course, been here many times, with a proposed UN solution in 2004, overseen by the then Secretary General, Kofi Annan, accepted by the Turkish community, but heavily reject-

ed by Greek Cypriots in a referendum.

It has always been agreed that some of the territory controlled by the Turkish Cypriots will be ceded to Greek Cypriot control in any peace deal.

The debate over how much should be handed over and its location has hampered previous talks.

Encouragingly, we seem to be close to establishing this, and the UK has offered to give up half the territory of its sovereign bases as part of any deal.

We face a real moment of truth here and will soon find out whether the east Mediterranean island nation can finally be reunified after decades of failed attempts and dashed hopes,

ALEX ORR Leamington Terrace, Edinburgh