The EU assents to the partial freezing of discussions with Ankara

"It will not be a suspension, even less a rupture. Rather, it will be something like a 'slowing-down' of negotiations", explains Jean-François Verdonnet. "The government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan tried to elude the crisis with a last minute proposition to open a port and airport to Cypriots. Initially saluted by Brussels as an 'important step', the offer was then judged too weak and too vague. The Turkish, notably, did not specifying whether their offer was unconditional, or subordinate to the end of isolation regarding the Turkish part of Cyprus. Resistance has also come from inside. Insufficient for Brussels, the concession has been judged excessive by Ankara. ... The Turkish polemic, being electoral in part, is not at all artificial. It reveals tight constraints on the Cyprus question that the European summations now have little chance of slackening."

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