A top UN diplomat says he is "pleased" with progress on talks aimed at solving the Cyprus problem. But Alexander Downer, a special adviser of the UN secretary general, stressed it was up to the two sides on the divided island to resolve their differences between them. Cyprus president Demetris Christofias and Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat have since held a second phase of the UN-led direct negotiations. In a statement following the meeting, former Australian foreign minister Downer said, “They had positions which they articulated on the question of the election of the executive in the first round. They had different positions. They have come back here with new bridging proposals and they initially presented those bridging proposals today." Downer said the UN wants to see the leaders work it through in their own way and are there only to help. During the 40 meetings of the first round of talks, the leaders have discussed six chapters: governance and power sharing, EU matters, security and guarantees, territory, property and economic matters, writing down the agreed and disagreed issues. Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkish troops invaded and occupied 37 per cent of the island.
The position of the Russian Federation as regards the settlement of the Cyprus problem remains unchanged: We stand in favour of the implementation of the relevant UN Security Council resolutions and against the foreign imposition on the sides of any ‘recipes’ and artificial timeframes for the settlement. The leaders of the Russian Federation have repeatedly underlined that the final settlement of the dispute is only feasible through the attainment of a comprehensive agreement between the Cypriot communities with the support of the international community, taking into consideration the positions of each one and with respect to the agreed negotiating and peace-keeping processes. And it is of course imperative that there has never been an issue, on behalf of Russia, of recognising the so-called ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus’.
The first Russian patrol boat has arrived in the Republic of Abkhazia to protect the sea borders of the young state which declared independence from Georgia last summer following Tbilisi's attack on South Ossetia. It was recognized by Moscow in 2008. The Novorossiysk is the first of a flotilla of ten vessels to be based at the Black Sea port of Ochamchira. Russia’s Federal Security Service also announced that a base for Black Sea Fleet ships is to be established in Abkhazia, while illegal trespassers from neighbouring Georgia would be detained by Russian border guards. Vyacheslav Chirikba, a foreign policy adviser to the Abkhazian President, says the decision to send patrol boats to the republic is a lawful response to Georgian actions.
"Our position on Kosovo is not just a matter of affection towards Serbia, nor does it have anything to do with our position towards the U.S. or Russia,” Fico told a joint press conference after meeting with Serbian Prime Minister Mirko Cvetković. According to the Slovakian TASR agency, Fico also warned that his government’s refusal to recognize Kosovo showed how far Slovakia would go to defend its own state interests against the “dangerous policies pursued against Slovakia’s sovereignty” by one of the two relevant Hungarian parties in Slovakia, the Party of the Hungarian Coalition. The minister said that Belgrade had achieved a diplomatic success by bringing the question of Kosovo’s unilateral independence before the International Court of Justice (ICJ). Earlier today, Cvetković told Slovakian President Ivan Gašparovič that Belgrade intended to launch new talks on Kosovo’s status after the ICJ’s ruling.
The name dispute with Greece is the only obstacle for FYROMacedonia’s European Atlantic ambitions, said Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski. “I assess positive good neighborly relations besides name dispute with Greece. We do not have any other serious problems despite these are the Balkans,” Gruevski pointed. In his words Macedonia has the ambition to improve its relations with the neighbor countries and would continue in this direction.
During cooperative Frontex patrol in the Aegean sea, a Latvian helicopter detected a Turkish coast guard vessel close to the islet of Farmakonisi, which not only failed to thwart a smuggling vessel from entering Greek waters but actively assisted it, the Greek daily Kathimerini reported on September 21 2009. Frontex, is a European Union agency with headquarters in Warsaw, Poland. The agency was established as a specialised and independent body tasked to coordinate the operational cooperation between European member states in the field of border security. "We have to mention... at 8.01 [am] a suspicious target detected in Greek territorial waters moving to the east... At 8.02, the suspicious target has been recognised as a Turkish coast guard vessel," Kathimerini said, quoting the official report from the Latvian aircraft. The pilots have submitted documentation and pictures on September 14 to European authorities, implicating a Turkish coast guard vessel providing escort for a smuggling boat into Greek national waters.
Though recent developments shine a glimmer of hope toward religious freedom in Turkey, there is still a long way to go, scholars and legal experts said at the Fordham School of Law. The conference "Religious Freedom in Turkey: The Case of the Ecumenical Patriarch" featured discussion about efforts to end the sometimes daily persecution of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Consider: Almost all of its property has been seized by successive Turkish governments. Its schools have been closed and its prelates taunted by extremists who demonstrate almost daily outside the Patriarchate, calling for its ouster from Turkey. His All Holiness Bartholomew, Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome is denied his title of “Ecumenical” Patriarch. His All Holiness Bartholomew, Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome and Ecumenical Patriarch, will visit Fordham in late October. Archbishop Demetrios, the primate of the Greek Orthodox Church in America, attended the conference and thanked organizers for "shedding light on a complex issue." The conference was sponsored by the Law School’s Institute on Religion, Law and Lawyer’s Work and Fordham’s Orthodox Christian Studies Program.