TRNC News Today  23rd July 

PRESIDENT EROĞLU IS GOING TO BRUSSELS TONIGHT (23rd July) IN ORDER TO MEET WITH BARROSO AND FULE

President Derviş Eroğlu is going to Brussels tonight in order to meet with the President of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso, and the member of European Commission for Enlargement, Štefan Füle. According to the statement made by the Presidency Press Office, President Eroğlu will fly to Brussels at 21.00 tonight (23rd July) from Ercan Airport.

Eroğlu will meet with Barroso and Füle on Wednesday at 15.00, local time in the TRNC.  Presidency Undersecretary Hasan Güngör and Presidency Special Representative are to accompany Eroğlu and they will return to the TRNC on Thursday, 25th July.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS MINISTER ERK: ‘THE WAY GREEK CYPRIOT GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDIA HANDLE THE SITUATION IS UPSETTING’

Foreign Affairs Minister, Kutlay Erk, has said that he found the way in which the Greek Cypriot Government and the media handled the incident which happened during transfer of oil from a ship at AKSA Power Plant in the Kalecik Region of İskele district on 16th July very upsetting. The Greek Cypriots’ manner about this incident was in such a way that it was not likely to help co-operation between the two governments in the future, said the Foreign Minister Erk and added: ‘The news in the Greek Cypriot Media about the petroleum leakage into the water are highly misrepresented and far from sensible about an environmental disaster.’

GOVERNMENT’S MANNER

In the presence of this news, Erk said that all related parties should know about this manner and continued:

‘All the required works and efforts have been launched in order to prevent an environmental disaster caused by petroleum and oil leakage and the United Nations has been consulted in order to make a research about the existence of required materials in the Greek Cypriot side. Having in mind that there was co-operation between the two sides in 2011 when an explosion and a following power cut occurred at a naval base in the Greek Cypriot side we, through the Turkish Cypriot Chamber of Commerce, requested required materials for the incident from Greek Cypriot side. Our aim primarily has been to make use of both the materials and support from Turkey and the oil absorbent kits bought from Greek Cypriot side in order to prevent the leakage from spreading around.

Turkish Cypriot side has never evaluated this co-operation in a political way and handled it sensibly like we did in the past during the power cut incident.

Our government appreciates the co-operation between the Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot Chambers of Commerce in order to prevent this environmental disaster.

ERTUĞ GAVE WARM WISHES TO MAVROYANNIS

Osman Ertuğ, Special Representative of President Derviş Eroğlu, made a phone call to Andreas Mavroyannis, Special Representative of the Greek Cypriot leader, Nikos Anastasiadis, in order to congratulate him.

According to the information received, the phone conversation between the two representatives at 15.00 took place in an open and sincere atmosphere.

The Special Representatives consulted on the issues of the forthcoming negotiations, progression of the negotiations and how to come to a solution in the soonest time. Ertuğ also conveyed his warm wishes to Mavroyannis with this phone call.

‘FINANCIAL TIMES’ GOT GREEK CYPRIOTS’ REACTION

British Daily newspaper ‘Financial Times’ got the Greek Cypriots’ reaction as it used the expression of ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus’ in an article published on 19^th July.

Under the headline ‘Provocative Article of Financial Times’ Greek Cypriot daily ‘Simerini’ asserted that ‘Financial Times’ described ‘Occupied Cyprus’ as the ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus’ in its article and thus published a provocative article.

Citing in detail that the writer was criticized due to not using ‘Timbu’ as the expression for Ercan Airport, the newspaper pointed out that the article was published a day before 20th July.

Source : TRNC Public Information Office