Turkey blasts Greek FM for statement on Cyprus

ANKARA (AA) - Turkey's Foreign Ministry Thursday called Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Kotzias's statement on the 43rd anniversary of the Cyprus Peace Operation "unacceptable".

Earlier on Thursday, Kotzias issued a statement, calling the anniversary "sad", saying it was "one of the most tragic pages in the history of Hellenism".

"Not hope for an immediate resolution of the Cyprus problem, as this is unfortunately not yet possible due to Turkey's continuing intransigence, but hope because the international community now appears to realize what is obvious, which is set down in the resolutions of the United Nations; that is, that the reunited Cyprus must be a normal modern state, fully sovereign, fully independent and with territorial integrity," Kotzias said in a statement on the Greek ministry's website.

In a statement, Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Huseyin Muftuoglu said: "As the prime minister once again emphasized in Lefkosa today, the Peace Operation was carried out within the framework of the rights and obligations of Turkey arising from international treaties."

Muftuoglu said, with the operation, Turkey had put an end to the suffering that has occurred on the island and had ensured that it would not be repeated again.

"As a guarantor, Turkey showed the whole world that day that it would not allow Enosis [ a Greek takeover of Cyprus], and that Turkish Cypriots were not alone."

"Turkey maintains its determination not to allow the common struggle of Greek Cypriots and Greece, expressed in the Greek Foreign Minister's message, to target the existence and freedom of the Turkish Cypriot people," Muftuoglu added.

The eastern Mediterranean island has been divided since 1974 when Turkish soldiers interceded under Ankara’s guarantor status to protect the Turkish community.

Violence broke out amid a Greek Cypriot attempt to forcibly unite Cyprus with Greece, which was then ruled by a military junta. Turkey sent 40,000 troops -- Operation Atilla -- to the island’s north.

Negotiations over Cyprus have been marked by a failed 2004 peace plan -- which the Greek Cypriot side rejected but the Turkish Cypriots agreed to in a referendum -- as well as the collapse earlier this month of talks in Crans-Montana, Switzerland.