President of the National Federation of Cypriots in the UK Peter Drousiotis has sent a letter to the leader of the Labour Party Ed Miliband asking him to exert his influence so that former British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw stops his “frequent provocative comments“ against the Republic of Cyprus such as the ones he made recently in the Turkish daily `Radikal.`
“This behaviour“, Drousiotis states in a statement, “runs the risk of doing serious damage to our community`s relations with the Labour party“.
Straw`s comments effectively call for the partition of Cyprus which is a long standing Turkish policy, and are contrary to the international community`s stance on Cyprus as reflected in numerous resolutions of the United Nations and disregard the clear Treaty obligations, which the UK has before the Republic of Cyprus, it is noted.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974 when Turkish troops invaded and since then occupy 37% of the island`s territory.