NICOSIA: Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Cyprus President Nikos Christodoulides met on the sidelines of a summit in Hungary on Thursday, Cypriot officials said, in a rare and unusual encounter between traditional foes.

Turkiye’s foreign minister Hakan Fidan was also present, while they were later joined by Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Edi Rama, prime ministers of Greece and Albania respectively, Cypriot deputy government spokesperson Yiannis Antoniou said in a post on X.

The meeting was not planned. Encounters between the leaders of Turkiye and Cyprus seldom occur and are almost always by chance. The two countries do not have diplomatic relations, as a result of a bitter conflict going back decades and the division of the island between Greek and Turkish Cypriots.

Photos released from the encounter showed Erdogan and Christodoulides with other officials sitting around a low coffee table in a conference hall. In Athens, officials said the discussion focussed on the US presidential election and international developments.

Published in Dawn, November 8th, 2024