Turkey says UN lost neutrality after world body condemns Cyprus roadwork, assault on peacekeepers

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkey’s foreign minister has accused the United Nations of abandoning its neutrality. Hakan Fidan’s comment on Tuesday comes a day after the U.N. Security Council criticized construction work by Turkish Cypriots inside a buffer zone dividing Cyprus and condemned their assault on U.N. peacekeepers. Last week angry Turkish Cypriots punched and kicked a group of international peacekeepers that blocked crews working on a road that would encroach on the island’s U.N.-controlled buffer zone. The road is designed to connect the village of Arsos, in the Turkish Cypriot north, with the multi-ethnic village of Pyla, which is inside the buffer zone. Cyprus was divided into a breakaway Turkish Cypriot north and an internationally recognized Greek Cypriot south in 1974.