Foreign Minister Tahsin Ertuğruloğlu has said that the Turkish Cypriot side will continue to advocate for a two-state solution in Cyprus based on sovereign equality and equal international status.

In an end-of-year interview to the Turkish Anadolu Agency, Ertuğruloğlu touched upon the latest developments on the Cyprus Issue and clarified his remarks made during a recent visit to Pakistan.

“My remarks that we are not seeking recognition for the TRNC were distorted by some newspapers in the TRNC,” he said, arguing that the claims made by some dailies that he did not want the recognition of the TRNC did not reflect the truth.

The TRNC foreign minister said that such claims were not convincing as he was someone who had dedicated his entire life for the recognition of the TRNC.

“What I said was that the recognition of the TRNC was currently not possible under the current circumstances,” he said.

Ertuğruloğlu also said that seeking the recognition of sovereign equality and equal international status was not the same as seeking political recognition for the TRNC.

“These terms should not be confused,” he said, adding that the recognition of two states with sovereign equality was necessary for the launch of new talks.

Ertuğroğlu said that political recognition was something that would follow.

He also said that official negotiations cannot begin as long as the Greek Cypriot side’s policies continued to receive acceptance by the international community.

Ertuğroğlu also argued that the existence of state could not be determined through its political recognition.

“The whole world knows that the TRNC exists. The fact that it is not recognized does not change its existence,” he said.

Regarding the efforts of the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to restart talks, Ertuğruloğlu said that his failure to reconvene a second informal meeting as he had announced in April was proof that common ground did not exist between the two sides.

“This will not change as long as the UN continues to recognise one side as the legitimate government of Cyprus and the other as a community,” he said, adding that the time had come for the UN Secretary-General to openly declare that no common ground existed.