NIGERIA TO RETURN TO DEMOCRATIC, CIVILIAN GOVERNMENT BY MAY 1999, HEAD OF STATE OF NIGERIA TELLS GENERAL ASSEMBLY CORRECTION

Press Release
GA/9452/

NIGERIA TO RETURN TO DEMOCRATIC, CIVILIAN GOVERNMENT BY MAY 1999, HEAD OF STATE OF NIGERIA TELLS GENERAL ASSEMBLY CORRECTION

On page 14 of Press Release GA/9452 of 24 September, the statement in right of reply by the representative of Turkey should read as follows:

VOLKAN VURAL (Turkey), speaking in exercise of the right of reply to a statement made by the Foreign Minister of Greece this afternoon, said the record must be set straight as distortions must not be allowed to circulate freely. It was evident that, with regard to the relationship between Turkey and Greece, the Greek Foreign Minister had a selective memory. That seemed especially true when the fact that Greece wanted to turn the Aegean Sea into a Greek lake was not mentioned. Greece's highly restricted acceptance of the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice had been conveniently ignored. "Amnesia may be a Greek word. But it cannot be a licence for serious omissions." Only a few hours ago, the Turkish Prime Minister had called in his statement to the Assembly for a dialogue between the two countries to resolve outstanding problems. He urged the Minister to rise to the occasion. On the issue of Cyprus, he said the Minister had omitted the tragic events of the 1960s, but the Turkish Cypriot people remembered the ethnic cleansing inflicted upon them by Greek Cypriots, and the loss of their constitutional rights. He quoted the words of late Archbishop Makarios when he addressed the Security Council on 19 July 1974, as follows: "The coup of the Greek junta is an invasion, and from its consequences the whole people of Cyprus suffers, both Greeks and Turks." That mentality was still the main obstacle to reconciliation. Turkey had intervened in 1974 in exercise of its treaty rights as a guarantor Power, and was committed to protect the Turkish Cypriot people from the fate of those who had suffered from ethnic and religious hatred and cleansing efforts.

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