NICOSIA, Aug. 28 (Xinhua) -- United Nations (UN) Secretary General Antonio Guterres stands ready to assist the stalled peace process in Cyprus, a Cypriot official said on Monday, quoting a letter by Guterres.
Government spokesman Nicos Christodoulides told reporters that Guterres sent the letter to President Nicos Anastasiades in reply to a communication in which the Cypriot president complained about plans by Turkish and Turkish Cypriot officials to seek a Cyprus solution outside the framework set by the UN.
"The Secretary General says in his letter that the United Nations is ready to assist the peace process in Cyprus, should the two sides in Cyprus request so", Christodoulides said.
Guterres declared the Cyprus negotiations at a deadlock in July, after the Greek and Turkish Cypriots and the three Guarantor powers of Cyprus -- Greece, Turkey and the United Kingdom -- failed to reach a final agreement on the reunification of Cyprus at an international conference in a Swiss Alpine resort.
Guterres sent the parties to reflect on the outcome of the negotiations before deciding on his next moves in the context of a good services mission entrusted to him by the Security Council.
However, prospects for resuming negotiations seemed to move away after Turkey said it will seek a solution outside the parameters set by Guterres.
Turkey occupied the north part of Cyprus in a 1974 military operation in response to a coup by the military leaders of Greece at the time.
The collapse of the negotiations came after Turkey's foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Ankara would never accept to withdraw all its troops from Cyprus and to terminate guarantee and intervention rights in Cyprus it had obtained in 1960.
Turkey's deputy Prime Minister in charge of Cyprus, Recep Akdag, arrived Monday in the occupied part of Cyprus for talks with Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci on the next moves of the Turkish side.
Akdag said on arrival that Turkey would support a Cyprus solution but he did not say whether it will consent to the continuation of the peace negotiations.
Christodoulides said the Cypriot government expects consultations to take place in New York with Guterres, when Anastasiades will attend the UN annual General Assembly later this year.
