Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar on Wednesday said that Greek Cypriots are “trying to manipulate voters with messages” ahead of next month’s Turkish Cypriot leadership election.

While he did not reference specific incidents, he called the practice “unacceptable” during an interview with Kibris Postasi TV.

Both President Nikos Christodoulides and government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis have in recent months made reference to the forthcoming election, with Letymbiotis last month saying that Tatar’s rhetoric “will intensify even more” as the election draws closer.

Christodoulides had in June warned of “daily divisive rhetoric” on the campaign trail, which he said is “aimed at serving some of their own purposes”.

“I want to state officially that we are not going to follow or get involved in any games which would serve purposes which some may aim to achieve,” he said, adding on this matter that “we are not going to be offering Tatar daily responses”.

Tatar on Wednesday also spoke about the most recent enlarged meeting on the Cyprus problem, which took place in July, and said that at some point during the two-day meeting, he had found himself stood next to Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan and across from Greek Foreign Minister Giorgos Gerapetritis.

At this point, he said, he asked, “how can you, as a European state, as the Republic of Cyprus, accept this?”, before asking Gerapetritis, “how can you, as the European Union, make such a discrimination?”

He said he received no response “because their intention is evil”.

“Their intention is to disrupt the unity and solidarity of North Cyprus’ government,” he said.

He then added that the Greek Cypriot side “has been operating with this mentality for years”, before going on to say that this mentality states that “Turkey is an occupier, and those it brings are also occupiers”.

He also insisted that his five years in office have been a success, describing himself as a “very active president” and pointing out that he had attended events held by both the Organisation of Turkic States and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.

“I sit there at every meeting. [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan, [Vice President] Cevdet Yilmaz, and officials from the Turkish foreign ministry say these are achievements from my term, because a new page has been turned,” he said.

Closer to home, he pointed out the establishment of 12 technical committees which operate under the auspices of his office, and said that those committees “do not evoke a federation, but aim to strengthen two-state cooperation”.

“I also emphasised this goal in our meetings in Geneva and in New York in March and in July. Work was carried out on issues such as crossing points, the economy, cultural heritage, the environment, climate change, and disaster management,” he said.

He also made reference to the creation of the bicommunal technical committee on youth, where he said, “32 young people are exchanging ideas”, and half of them are “becoming true representatives of the Turkish Cypriot people”.

On the matter of crossing points, however, he said that while the prospect of crossing points in the eastern Nicosia suburb of Mia Milia and the village of Louroujina, which is located between Larnaca and Nicosia, are “on the table”, they “cannot be opened due to the mentality of the other side”.

“There are extremely radical elements on the rise in southern Cyprus, such as extreme nationalism,” he added.

If Tatar loses next month’s election, he will become the first Turkish Cypriot leader to have never overseen the opening of a crossing point.

Looking ahead to that election, he said polling is at present not showing “a clear picture”.

“It may change by a few points, but there is no clear frontrunner. The final 40 days will be crucial. The election is starting now, and everyone will be on the ground,” he said.

The Turkish Cypriot leadership election will take place on October 19.