UN chief António Guterres says he is ‘very sorry’ as he announces no agreement reached in the early hours of the morning

What had been billed as the best chance to reunify Cyprus has collapsed spectacularly, fuelling fears that the Mediterranean island is heading towards permanent partition.

UN-sponsored talks held in the Swiss Alps for the past 10 days were brought to an abrupt halt on Friday after negotiations descended in the early hours into “yelling and drama,” ending the greatest hope yet of resolving the 43-year dispute.

The Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akıncı, who had staked his political career on a solution, predicted that future efforts to reunite Cyprus under a federal umbrella would be exceptionally difficult.

Addressing reporters hours after the visibly despondent UN secretary general, Antonio Guterres, announced the failure, he said: “I wish the next generation good luck on this and that one day maybe Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots will decide together that there is no longer a need for troops on the island.”

The issue of maintaining military intervention rights – insisted upon by Turkey – under a tripartite “guarantor power” security system conceived when Cyprus won independence from Britain, lay at the crux of the collapse.

While the UN special adviser Espen Barth Eide, who had chaired the talks, described the positions of both sides as “close but not close enough”, diplomats said it was sparring over troop presence and guarantor status that ultimately scuppered progress.

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Turkey has kept an estimated 40,000 soldiers on the island since invading and seizing its northern third in response to a rightwing coup aimed at uniting Cyprus with Greece in 1974.

The Turkish foreign minister, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, attributed the breakdown to the insistence of Athens and Greek Cypriots that Ankara pull out the entire military force, saying: “For Turkey and the Turkish Cypriot side it is not acceptable for troops to be withdrawn.”

Greece’s foreign ministry spokesman Stratos Efthymiou said it was similarly impossible for the Greek side to countenance an envisioned federal Cyprus with occupation troops on its soil and Turkey clinging to the right of unilateral intervention.

“This is a non-starter for us,” he told the Guardian before departing Switzerland. “We were willing to negotiate [troop numbers] but Cyprus is an independent EU state. It is not acceptable for a third state to have the unilateral right of [military] intervention in 2017.”

Memories of Turkish invasion are vivid among the majority population of Greek Cypriots, one in three of whom became refugees overnight in 1974. Britain and Greece had argued in favour of abolishing guarantor status, seen by both as anachronistic in the 21stcentury.

The collapse of talks was met with unbridled disappointment. Veteran diplomats voiced fears of possible annexation of the north by Turkey. Others expressed concerns that under the ever-unpredictable leadership of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Ankara could also pursue the path of further partition by pushing for international recognition of the rump state currently recognised solely by Turkey.

Pro-unification supporters, who had also converged on Cans-Montana in anticipation of a settlement finally being announced, described a mood of dismay.

“Everyone is a bit numb. We are in a scenario where everyone loses,” said Pavlos Nacouzi, a member of the Unite Cyprus Now group. “It was the first time where we really thought the outcome would be different, where we had two leaders who so seemed to want a solution. It’s hard to know where things are heading, but what is sure is that we are not going to give up.”

Euripides Evriviades (@eevriviades) Bleak day 4 #Cyprus & all its people. In diplomacy there's no full stop; just a comma. Must continue 4 solution. Cyprus 4 Cypriots ONLY 🇨🇾🇪🇺 https://t.co/JC1X8mjIRV

Older Cypriots, who still harbour memories of common coexistence, expressed anguish that the island was now heading irrevocably towards partition. “This is the end of the road for Cyprus as we knew it,” said Lakis Zavallas, a National Guard platoon commander during the invasion.

“Thousands of years of history will be forgotten and rewritten and the north of our island turned into a Turkish province. And we shall continue squabbling among ourselves squashed in the part we are left with until we make the next mistake and lose it too.”

Cypriots from both sides of the ethnic divide announced that they would protest in the UN-patrolled buffer zone dividing the island’s capital, Nicosia.



But echoing Guterres, the Greek Cypriot government spokesman Nikos Christodoulides insisted the failure of the talks wasn’t “the end of the road”.

“The existing, unacceptable situation can’t be Cyprus’ future and the president will redouble his efforts,” he said referring to Nicos Anastasiades, who had also assumed office promising to reunite the island.

Britain’s minister for Europe, Sir Alan Duncan, said the UK also remained unwavering in its commitment to a deal on Cyprus. “This is a disappointing outcome,” he said in a statement. “The UK continues to be a strong supporter of a settlement. Now is a time for calm reflection and consideration of future steps.”