UNITED NATIONS, April 26 (UPI) -- The U.N. official overseeing reunification efforts on Cyprus said his goodbyes Monday after the effort to join Greeks and Turks on the divided island failed.
Alvaro de Soto, the special adviser named by U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, made the rounds as the United Nations began the process of shutting down its presence on the island, said the chief spokesman at U.N. World Headquarters in New York, Fred Eckhard.
De Soto's meetings included encounters with Greek Cypriot leader Tassos Papadopoulos and Turkish Cypriot leaders Mehmet Ali Talat and Serdar Denktash. He is scheduled to make his way back to New York to brief the Security Council, the spokesman said.
Saturday Greek Cypriot voters rejected a plan put forward by Annan that would have created a United Cyprus Republic - composed of a Greek Cypriot constituent state and Turkish constituent state, linked by a federal government. Turkish Cypriots gave their approval for the plan.
Now, when Cyprus joins the European Union Saturday, it will be represented only by the Greek Cypriots.
