Polls show uphill fight to win yes vote on Cyprus

With less than a week to go until referendums on Cyprus, the international community faced an uphill struggle to secure a "yes" vote on reuniting the island, polls showed yesterday, but had gained some ground.

International pressure - notably from the United States, European Union, former colonial power Britain and the United Nations - to win over Greek Cypriots opposed to the UNpeace plan had paid some dividends, according to polls published in Cyprus and Greece. But "no" voters were still the majority.

About 600,000 islanders, two-thirds of them Greek Cypriots, vote on the powersharing plan on Saturday, which the UN hopes will usher a united island into the European Union on May 1.

An SRI poll for the Greek Cypriot Politis daily showed the vote would be rejected by 59 per cent of Cypriots. Some 17 per cent would vote in favour and 29 per cent were undecided.

Politis said the poll, carried out over a three-day period, showed resistance to the plan dropping gradually, from 71 per cent on April 14, the first day surveyed.

Across the "Green Line" dividing the island, Turkish Cypriot approval of the plan was growing, standing at 62.1 per cent, according to a poll by the Turkish Cypriot market research firm Kadem and the Kibris newspaper.

A similar poll a month ago showed support at 52 per cent.

In Athens, an Eleftherotypia newspaper-commissioned VPRC poll showed Greek Cypriot opposition at 66.9 per cent - about 20 points lower than a survey at the start of this month. The "yes" vote was at 19.8 per cent.

Politis said of those "undecided" most were likely to favour the UN plan but did not want to say so publicly. "In the present climate, it is easier for Greek Cypriots to publicly state they are against rather than in favour," Politis said.

People in favour of the plan are outgunned by an aggressive campaign from the "no" camp which has covered the capital, Nicosia, with hundreds of banners.

The rejectionists say they mainly want back more territory taken from Greek Cypriots by Turkey's 1974 invasion.

Only a few "yes" posters have gone up in recent days. "If I put a yes sticker on my car I'm likely to find a brick through the windshield," said one person in favour of the plan.

The plan needs to be approved on both sides of Cyprus to be implemented. Without an accord, only the larger and wealthier Greek Cypriot part will join the EU.

Cyprus gained independence from Britain in 1960 but the island was effectively partitioned when Turkey invaded northern Cyprus in 1974 after a Greek Cypriot coup engineered by the military then ruling Greece.

In a barrage of support for the UN plan, the EU has pledged not to leave Turkish Cypriots out in the cold if Greek Cypriots vote it down. US Secretary of State Colin Powell has warned another chance for peace would not come for decades.