Time is running out in the negotiations on a Cyprus settlement, which have a very short window of opportunity before May 1st, when the country is due to join the European Union. If the talks fail, the southern Greek Cypriot state will join, with entry frozen for the Turkish northern zone until a settlement is reached, and Turkey's EU aspirations disappointed.
So far the renewed effort to reach agreement, under way for three weeks, has been bogged down in an exchange of position papers which does not reflect the intense international pressure on both sides.
The Turkish Cypriot president and chief negotiator, Mr Rauf Denktash, has now threatened to withdraw from the talks unless his basic demands for a bizonal entity are met. Squaring the circle between them and the Swiss-style federation or confederation proposed by the United Nations secretary general, Mr Kofi Annan, is the greatest difficulty between the parties. But Mr Denktash is notoriously opposed to compromise and is playing his own game of intransigence. He cannot hold out against determined pressure from the Turkish government, according to close observers. The Turkish prime minister, Mr Tayyip Erdogan, is becoming impatient with the slow progress and is having to fight his own battles against Mr Denktash's influential allies in Ankara.
Two further decisive stages in the process will see Turkey and Greece join the talks on March 22nd and Mr Annan's right to put proposals to a referendum in both parts of Cyprus in April. But unless more movement is made in the next two weeks it is hard to see either of these externalities shifting entrenched positions between the primary negotiators. As the talks proceed more and more issues arise to underline the difficulties involved. Greek Cypriot hopes for a right of return to properties abandoned or seized during the Turkish invasion of 1974 have come up against the realities of migration from the Turkish mainland there in the meantime. Compensation could run to many millions of euro, while the overall cost of reunification has been estimated as high as €16 billion, a colossal sum, which has shocked Greek Cypriot taxpayers and could influence their vote in any referendum.
This is the type of jostling which accompanies any such negotiating endgame. But this one has been going on for so long and with so many entrenched positions that it needs sustained external pressure to open up space for agreement. There is no shortage of candidates to apply it. The European Union, the United States and the United Nations all have a central interest, along with Turkey and Greece. It is time they worked together more effectively to take advantage of this unique opportunity.