NICOSIA, Aug 31: Cyprus threatened on Wednesday to block the start of Turkey’s EU accession negotiations if an EU response to Ankara’s refusal to recognise the island fell short of Nicosia’s expectations.

“If it is not satisfactory then the negotiating framework of the EU with Turkey will not be discussed,” said Cypriot government spokesman Kypros Chrysostomides, referring to an informal summit of EU foreign ministers meeting in Newport, Wales, on Thursday.

“If there is no debate and agreement on the negotiating framework the (accession) negotiations will not start,” he said in response to a question.

Turkey signed a key protocol extending its EU customs union with all 10 new member states in July, but angered Nicosia by stating it did not imply recognition of Cyprus.

Ankara does not have diplomatic relations with Cyprus’s Greek Cypriot government, which represents the whole of the island in the EU. It recognises a breakaway Turkish Cypriot state in Cyprus’s north, territory it invaded in 1974 in response to a brief Greek Cypriot coup engineered by the military then governing Greece.

Nicosia wants an EU response clearly outlining that Turkey’s non-recognition declaration has no legal significance and that Ankara adopt the customs union protocol with the island immediately.

“The British (EU) presidency undertook to present a draft of a counter declaration which was tabled this afternoon. In our view, despite some of the positive elements it contains, the draft is unacceptable and not satisfactory at all,” Chrysostomides said.

“There was no display of the necessary objectivity or impartiality. On the contrary there were attempts to introduce into this statement elements of the British policy,” he said.—Reuters