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Ersin Tatar gets 51.7 percent of the votes in the second and decisive electoral round, the media report. Tatar is close to the Ankara government and was championed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan before the elections.
Ankara rejoiced
Ankara welcomed the result shortly after the Tatar victory was completed.
Tatar has previously been appointed Prime Minister in the part officially known to Turkey as the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Its status as a state has only been recognized by Turkey.
Before the elections, Tatar has advocated for a two-state solution for the island and therefore opposes attempts to reach a unifying solution.
Tatar defeated incumbent President Mustafa Akinci in the second and final round of elections. Akinci is seen as more open to trying to negotiate a solution for the divided island.
“It is too early to comment on election night, but judging from Tatar’s previous position on the peace talks on a united Cyprus, it is difficult to see that the negotiations can continue where they left off,” said Paul T Levin, Director of the Institute for Turkish Studies. at the University of Stockholm.
Levin says one idea was that negotiations on the future of the island would resume under UN auspices after the elections. The first negotiations took place in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, three years ago, and then, according to Levin, the parties took a big step forward, although several crucial issues remained.
Turkish gas search
Attempts to reunify Cyprus have been going on since 1974, when a Greek-backed military coup on the island resulted in Turkey invading the northern part of Cyprus. The southern part of the Greek Cypriot is the one that is formally recognized as a country. The Turkish Cypriot part of the north has only been recognized by Turkey and is considered occupied by Greece.
The dispute has been intensified by Turkey’s search for natural gas and oil in the Mediterranean, leading to Cypriot demands in the EU for sanctions against Turkey.
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