Congressmen urge Obama to enhance US support for Cyprus’ reunification

US Senator Robert Menendez, Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and US Representative Ed Royce, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, have written to US President Barack Obama urging the US Administration to increase attention to the goal of reunifying Cyprus.
In the letter, they said that “reunification would allow Cyprus to fully realise its potential as a stable democracy and a regional leader anchored in the western security architecture that is capable of bolstering European energy security.”
“Forty years after the violent conflict that divided Cyprus, we urge you to increase the United States’ attention to the longstanding goal of reunifying the island and restoring the human rights and basic freedoms of all its citizens,” they noted.
Menendez and Royce said that “an EU Member, Cyprus has proven itself to be a reliable partner to the United States, including in counterterrorism and nonproliferation efforts.
“As reunification can only come from sincere negotiations between the island’s communities, we believe that the United States has a critical role to play in supporting the negotiating process that resumed earlier this year,” they noted.
“In our roles in Congress we will work to support efforts to reach a solution that will restore peace on the island,” they pledged, urging President Obama “to likewise enhance US support for the reunification efforts and look forward to working with you to end these 40 long years of unjust and undeserved division.”

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.