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Cyprus: EU opposes peace deal giving Turks key freedoms

Cyprus: EU opposes peace deal giving Turks key freedoms

By ASSOCIATED PRESS

A girl hold a Turkish flag as she sit on top of her father as behind seen the posters of the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (left) and Turkey's Prime Minister Binali Yildirim during a rally to shore up support for a 'yes' vote in next month's referendum in Turkey on expanding presidential powers, at a stadium In the Turkish Cypriot breakaway northern part of the divided capital Nicosia in the eastern Mediterranean island of Cyprus, on Thursday, March 9, 2017. Photo: AP

NICOSIA: Cyprus' president says fellow European Union member states have rejected Turkey's demand that its citizens be granted the freedom to relocate and transfer money, services and goods to the ethnically divided island under any reunification deal. Nicos Anastasides said Saturday all EU leaders consider it a 'bad precedent' for Cyprus or any other country to breach bloc rules and grant such key freedoms to third-country citizens. Turkey said in January any Cyprus peace deal should incorporate such a condition. That further complicated difficult negotiations that stalled last month amid Turkish Cypriot anger over legislation to commemorate in Greek Cypriot schools a 1950 referendum calling for Cyprus' union with Greece. A 1974 Turkish invasion following a coup by supporters of union with Greece split Cyprus along ethnic lines.