With a month's reunification talks held in Nicosia failed to yield any significant progress, representatives of the Cyprus' two communities, plus Greek and Turkish officials, will gather in Swiss on Wednesday to snatch a final Cyprus solution. 

Based on a UN arrangement, the week-long talks at the Swiss resort of Buergenstock, near Lucerne, will culminate in the arrival on Saturday of Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, as well as UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

According to a timetable agreed in February by Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos and Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash in New York, if these talks do not lead to agreement by the end of March, Annan will fill in the blank and put his proposal to referenda on the two sides of the island on April 20. The aim is to have a reunified Cyprus join the European Union on May 1.

Announcing the conclusion of the Nicosia talks in a buffer zone in Nicosia on Monday night, UN Secretary General's special envoy Alvaro de Soto, who has presided over the talks so far, said "end game" had been reached.

"We are reaching the end of the road where the decision process has to take place", the top UN official said.

Papadopoulos and Denktash began direct talks on February 19, which were designed to allow the two leaders the chance to reach an agreement on their own. But they failed to complete the four-week talks with an agreement.

De Soto has blamed the two leaders for not entering into a spirit of give-and-take during the first phase of the talks.

"The important strides made at the technical level have not been matched in the leaders' meetings," de Soto said, adding "there have been glimmers here and there and the differences have been narrowed on some points but there has not yet been the kind of give and take on the core issues for which we had all hoped".

This means that the process at Burgenstock will have to be very intensive in order to reach a final agreement.

In the past month, an enormous amount of work has been done on a technical level. The Flag and Anthem committees had unanimously agreed on the choice, while the Laws Committee was well advanced, with 15 laws completed and 87 drafts ready to be completed.

However, on the major issues concerning territory adjustments, return of refugees, handling of Turkish settlers, security guarantees, sovereignty of each constituent state and power of a central government, differences between the two sides remain unchanged. Local observers believed that a solution is still possible.

On one hand, Turkey really wants a solution because it is facing an uphill struggle to receive the golden date from the European Union and the Cyprus problem has long been an obstacle to its target. For the Turkish Cypriots, entry into the European Union will bring them enormous benefits which is expected to amount to some 300 million Euros (US$360 million) at first stage as far as regional aid is concerned.

On the other hand, Greece has been pursuing a strategy of constructive engagement with Turkey for quite a long time and is eager to seek an early solution to the Cyprus issue.

Both sides on the island agreed that a plan proposed by Annan should not be accepted "as it is" and significant changes are needed so that the final solution can be viable and functional. But this target can only be reached by parties concerned. If a solution is imposed or decided by others, a "no" vote on the final arrangement can not be excluded.

Cyprus House Speaker Demetris Christofias, who is also the secretary of ruling Working People's Progressive Party (AKEL) and one of the main politicians to push for a solution, said if no breakthrough is made at the second phase of talks and leave all major differences to Annan, it will be difficult for the people to accept a final arrangement.

Cyprus has remained split since 1974 when Turkish troops entered the north of the island after a failed Greek Cypriot coup seeking union with Greece.

The two sides broke off peace talks nearly a year ago, but resumed under heavy international pressure in a bid to make a united Cyprus to enter the European Union on May 1. 

(Xinhua News Agency March 24, 2004)