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NICOSIA, March 23 (Xinhua) -- The leaders of the estranged Greek and Turkish communities of Cyprus may meet at dinner soon to resume their stalled negotiations aimed at ending the four-decade long division of Cyprus, an anonymous Cypriot official said on Thursday.
According to the official, a spokesman for Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci said Akinci has informed the UN Secretary General's Special adviser Espen Barth Eide that he will be ready to meet Anastasiades in a social setting at the end of March.
The statement came hours after ruling DISY party and the main opposition left-wing AKEL party said they would join forces in parliament in about two weeks' time to rectify a situation that was invoked by Akinci to pull out of the talks a month ago.
The spokesman for the all-Greek Cypriot government said in a statement that Akinci's decision to meet President Nicos Anastasiades in a social setting was a positive development.
It also said that Anastasiades had insisted all along on the continuation of substantive negotiations "to find a lasting, functional, and viable solution that will meet the reasonable concerns of Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, and won't deviate from the basic principles and values of the EU and the European acquis."
The dinner will take place after Anastasiades returns from a visit in the United States and an informal European Union summit in Rome to celebrate the completion of 60 years since the signing of the Treaty of Rome.
Sources said that Anastasiades and Akinci may meet before a vote in parliament on legislation tabled by DISY which in practice will revoke a previously approved law providing for a brief commemoration in public schools of the 1950 referendum on "enosis", or union with Greece.
Akinci's spokesman said the clearance of the legislation by the education parliamentary committee and the intention of DISY and AKEL to jointly support it in the plenum of the House of Representatives was a welcomed move in the right direction.
"The elimination of the celebration of enosis plebiscite in schools will pave the way to the resumption of the talks," he said. Enditem
