“Cyprus has lost a great leader, an era has passed”, said former UN Assistant Secretary General Gustave Feissel on former President of Cyprus Glafcos Clerides who passed away Friday.
“I am deeply saddened by the passing of President Clerides. I had the great privilege of knowing President Clerides and working with him for many years in the search for a solution to the Cyprus problem”, Feissel has told CNA.
The former UN official added that during the five years he spent in Cyprus he met with President Clerides “enumerable times”.
“I also hosted many meetings between him and Mr. Denktash (former Turkish Cypriot leader), including the five dinners in October 1994 which I hosted in an effort to identify concrete ways of making progress on an overall settlement and a series major goodwill measures”, Feissel said.
In his statement to CNA, the former UN official pointed out that “these efforts continued during the subsequent years, unfortunately to no avail”.
“No one has been more desirous than President Clerides of finding a solution to the Cyprus problem, nor to walk the extra mile to achieve that goal” he stressed.
Feissel said that he also had the great pleasure of knowing President Clerides as a person.
“I recall fondly the times on his boat and our many talks, as well as my last visit with him in March 2008. He was a man of deep wisdom and humor”.
According to Feissel, “Cyprus has lost a great leader. An era has passed”.
From 1993 to 1998 Feissel served as UN Assistant Secretary-General and Chief of Mission of the United Nations Operation in Cyprus. In that capacity, he was responsible for promoting a settlement of the Cyprus problem and was in charge of the United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP)