Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar said on Wednesday, October 24, that he was ready to open a new checkpoint in Mia Milia on the eastern outskirts of Nicosia.

In an interview with Kibris Postasi TV, he said that he had already discussed this issue with the “Prime Minister” of the north, Unal Ustel, after an informal dinner with President Nikos Christodoulides and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres last week.

According to him, the result of the discussion with Ustel was that “a road can be built in Mia Milia and a checkpoint can be prepared.” In this regard, he stated that the opening of a new checkpoint in Mia Milia “will be a very positive event for increasing trade.” He also said that such a checkpoint would “relieve traffic congestion” at and around the Ayios Dometios checkpoint.

“The opening of the checkpoint in Mia Milia is on the agenda. It would be right to open a traffic zone that would benefit both sides on the island,” he said.

After an informal dinner, it became known that Tatar and Christodoulides had agreed to hold future meetings to discuss the opening of additional checkpoints.

Mia Milia is one of the places that has been proposed for the opening of a new checkpoint, as well as the village of Piroi between Ercan Airport (Timbu) and Larnaca, as well as Kokkina, the Turkish Cypriot exclave between the villages of Pomos and Kato Pyrgos.

In June last year, Tatar insisted on opening a checkpoint in Mia Milia, but, according to him, this proposal ran into an obstacle when the Greek Cypriot side proposed opening a checkpoint in Kokkin.

At that time, he sharply cooled the ardor of the idea of creating a checkpoint in Kokkin, saying that it was impossible to open a checkpoint there, since it was a “sacred territory” and it functioned as a military base.

In August of this year, Mukhtar Piroya called for the construction of a checkpoint in his village and said that Christodoulides “promised us that [the checkpoint] would be the next step, along with the checkpoint in Mia Milia.”

Piroi would be a convenient location for a border crossing point for a relatively large part of the population of Cyprus. The village is located west of the city of Afienou, and thus the border crossing point could offer an alternative and faster route to Nicosia for residents of the city and its surrounding villages.

Source: cyprus-mail.com

https://cyprusbutterfly.com.cy/news/ersin-tatar-xochet-otkryit-novyij