Holguin’s mission will be ‘left to peter out’

The UN secretary-general’s personal envoy Maria Angela Holguin is very unlikely to return to Cyprus, a source close to the process has said, suggesting that her mission is all but over.

“Her mission will be left to peter out over the next couple of months, during which she could have some Cyprus-related contacts in foreign capitals,” said a source who asked for anonymity. A highly placed UN source, however, said he could not say whether she would be back or not.

Holguin was last in Cyprus in mid-May and there has been no announcement of another visit. In fact, the Turkish Cypriot side, which had insisted all along that her mission was for just six months, claimed that it will be over on Monday, July 8.

The Cyprus News Agency reported in early June that her mission had been extended by another three months, until September, but there has never been confirmation by anyone – not even the Cyprus government, which had originally claimed there was no time limit to her mission. An extension would require the consent of the Turkish Cypriot side, which has made its opposition to this very clear.

Holguin may have met the two leaders for the last time abroad. She saw President Nikos Christodoulides in Brussels on the sidelines of the European Council ten days ago, in a meeting he described as “very productive”. On Monday she met Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar in London.

The failure of Holguin’s mission was highlighted by the Russian Federation’s permanent representative at the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, on taking his role as Security Council president on Monday.

“The personal envoy of the UN secretary-general travelled to the island, spoke with both sides, only to find that the parties are far from a compromise solution that might be found,” he said.

Since the conference in Crans-Montana in 2017, “there has been no visible, tangible progress in the Cyprus negotiations,” he added.

This appeared to be the precursor to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ draft report on his Good Offices mission, in which he blamed both leaders for the lack of progress and questioned their sincerity.

“The increasing militarisation of both sides contradicts the political discourses of the leaders claiming to want a way forward on the Cyprus issue,” he said and reiterated his “call for both sides to refrain from such unilateral actions”.

He also highlighted the violations of the buffer zone by both sides, saying these “contributed to raising mistrust and are unhelpful in the current context”.

Everything now depends on Holguin’s report about her mission that will be given to the secretary-general this coming week. It will then be up to Guterres to decide whether it will be worth pursuing the efforts for a resumption of the talks in some way.

Speaking after Friday’s national council meeting, government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis, declined to say whether Holguin’s involvement would continue.

“We cannot anticipate the decision of the UN secretary-general; once he receives Ms Holguin’s report, he will announce his intentions as regards the next steps on the Cyprus issue,” he said.

Whether there will be any “next steps” or whether he will draw the curtain on the Cyprus issue nobody can say with any degree of certainty.

Former Disy leader Averof Neophytou, told the Sunday Mail that time was running out and that “we are heading towards the end of the last effort to find a settlement of the Cyprus issue.”

He said there may still be a tiny hope. “On July 8, Ms Holguin’s mission comes to an end, and she will submit her report to the UN secretary-general. Whether he considers it worth keeping Holguin on and having one last go in the next two or three months remains to be seen,” said Neophytou.

The decision belongs exclusively to Guterres, a point made by Nebenzia on Monday. “Extending the mandate of Ms Holguin is the absolute prerogative of the secretary-general as she is his personal envoy,” said Nebenzia.

The Christodoulides government seems undaunted by the bleak prospects for the Cyprus issue, preferring instead to repeat the rhetoric about the president’s many “initiatives in all directions”.

Letymbiotis, avoiding talking about the implications of Guterres ending Holguin’s mission, said on Friday that “the government will carry on undertaking initiatives.”

He repeated “the conviction of the government that it is through this undertaking of initiatives that the necessarily positive climate can be created for the resumption of talks, so long as this sincere political will is exhibited by the other sides.”

This is the official line although the source close to the process said that UN suggestions, which Ankara had greenlighted, were made to Christodoulides, but he rejected them, probably because he felt his acceptance would have been difficult to sell to the Greek Cypriots.

In an interview given to Kathimerini in May, before departing from Cyprus, Holguin said that Christodoulides “has a very clear picture of what could unlock the process”, but she did not elaborate.

The president’s reluctance to do this may prove to be the very last opportunity for a settlement. Everything now depends on what Guterres will decide.