ANKARA: Turkey has scored a significant diplomatic victory in UN-brokered peace talks to reunify Cyprus in time for the island's accession to the European Union in May, boosting its own chances of joining the pan-European bloc, analysts said Thursday.

The talks in Switzerland failed to produce a compromise between the Turkish and Greek Cypriot communities, backed by Turkey and Greece, on a UN peace plan, forcing UN chief Kofi Annan to fill in the blanks in the blueprint to be put to separate referenda in both sectors of the island on April 24.

But in an unprecedented move, Turkey - which occupied the northern part of the island in 1974 in response to a Greek Cypriot coup aimed at union with Greece - came away boosting it had been the more willing party in the tortuous Swiss talks to end the island's divison.

"Turkey has played this one very sensibly...The Turkish government can rightly say they have done something that no other government has been able to do in 30 years," a western diplomat told AFP.

This should prove 'mightily helpful' when EU leaders gather in December to decide whether to open membership talks with the mainly Muslim nation, the diplomat said on condition of anonymity.

The European Union has long been pressing for the reunification of Cyprus and has warned that failure to agree to a deal by May 1 would result in only the internationally- recognized Greek Cypriot south of the island entering the European club and the breakaway Turkish north being left out in the cold.

It has also warned Turkey that its own drive to join the bloc will suffer if it does not facilitate a settlement. The Swiss talks "is a good result for Turkey and for requirements set by the EU. The EU asked that Turkey do its best and Turkey did just that," Suha Bolukbasioglu, a professor of International Relations and an expert on Cyprus, said.

Huseyin Bagci, another professor of International Relations, agreed: "It is not possible for the European Union to deny Turkey a date" because of the Cyprus question.

The island's reunification hangs now on the outcome of the April 24 referenda, and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has already appealed to both Cypriot communities to vote 'yes'.

"We started this process with good will and of course we would like to see a result," he told reporters on late Wednesday. Recent opinion polls suggested that Greek Cypriots could oppose the deal, but observers here said that Turkish Cypriots, long isolated in their breakaway enclave and crushed under international embargoes, were more likely to endorse the plan.

"The Turkish Cypriot people want to say 'yes'. Otherwise, it would not be possible for Turkey to get a date from the EU," Hasan Koni, a professor of International Relations, told AFP.

But opposition is likely from veteran Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash who on Thursday signalled he did not deem the UN plan worthy of approval. "There are amendments in our favour, I do not want to be unfair, but in its current form, I do not see anything to vote 'yes' to," said Denktash, a fierce opponent of earlier UN blueprints who has faced protests from his own people for his uncompromising attitude on the plan.

Bagci brushed aside Denktash's outburst as a tactical move which would only strengthen Turkey's hand in its push to settle the Cyprus question. "Denktash's campaign is just the fight put up by a loser. It has no meaning. There will be a 'yes' vote in northern Cyprus," he argued. -AFP