1 killed, 10 Injured in Cable Car Accident in Southern Türkiye

This handout photograph taken and released on April 12, 2024 by Turkish news agency DHA (Demiroren News Agency) shows rescue teams conducting a rescue operation and helping injured people after a cable car cabin crashed into a fallen cable pole in Konyaalti district of Antalya. (Photo by Handout / DHA (Demiroren News Agency) / AFP)
This handout photograph taken and released on April 12, 2024 by Turkish news agency DHA (Demiroren News Agency) shows rescue teams conducting a rescue operation and helping injured people after a cable car cabin crashed into a fallen cable pole in Konyaalti district of Antalya. (Photo by Handout / DHA (Demiroren News Agency) / AFP)
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1 killed, 10 Injured in Cable Car Accident in Southern Türkiye

This handout photograph taken and released on April 12, 2024 by Turkish news agency DHA (Demiroren News Agency) shows rescue teams conducting a rescue operation and helping injured people after a cable car cabin crashed into a fallen cable pole in Konyaalti district of Antalya. (Photo by Handout / DHA (Demiroren News Agency) / AFP)
This handout photograph taken and released on April 12, 2024 by Turkish news agency DHA (Demiroren News Agency) shows rescue teams conducting a rescue operation and helping injured people after a cable car cabin crashed into a fallen cable pole in Konyaalti district of Antalya. (Photo by Handout / DHA (Demiroren News Agency) / AFP)

One person was killed and 10 others were injured on Friday in the southern Turkish province of Antalya after a cable car cabin collided with a broken pole and burst open, the interior ministry said on Saturday.

Twenty-four cabins were stranded in the air at 5:23 p.m. (1423 GMT) on Friday. Sixteen hours later, more than 60 people were still stranded in the remaining nine cabins in the air, the ministry said. One hundred and twelve people had been rescued.

None of the people waiting to be rescued had critical injuries or were in poor health, Disaster and Emergency Management Authority chairman Okay Memis told reporters at the scene, adding that they aimed to complete rescue work before sunset.

In a statement on social media platform X, the interior ministry said seven helicopters and more than 500 rescue workers were carrying out rescue efforts.

A video released by the interior ministry showed rescue personnel tied to safety ropes climbing into cabins.

The state-run Anadolu Agency identified the deceased as a 54-year-old Turkish man.

According to the information on its website, the cable car has 36 cabins with a capacity of six people each, and it takes an average of nine minutes to go uphill to the Tunektepe facility with panoramic views of the city of Antalya.



Türkiye Insists on Two States for Ethnically Divided Cyprus as the UN Looks to Restart Peace Talks

UN Secretary General's Special Representative in Cyprus Colin Stewart, center, Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and the Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar talk as they attend the UN's end of year reception at Ledras Palace inside the UNbuffer zone in the divided capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)
UN Secretary General's Special Representative in Cyprus Colin Stewart, center, Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and the Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar talk as they attend the UN's end of year reception at Ledras Palace inside the UNbuffer zone in the divided capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)
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Türkiye Insists on Two States for Ethnically Divided Cyprus as the UN Looks to Restart Peace Talks

UN Secretary General's Special Representative in Cyprus Colin Stewart, center, Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and the Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar talk as they attend the UN's end of year reception at Ledras Palace inside the UNbuffer zone in the divided capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)
UN Secretary General's Special Representative in Cyprus Colin Stewart, center, Cyprus' President Nikos Christodoulides, left, and the Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar talk as they attend the UN's end of year reception at Ledras Palace inside the UNbuffer zone in the divided capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Petros Karadjias)

Türkiye on Wednesday again insisted on a two-state peace accord in ethnically divided Cyprus as the United Nations prepares to meet with all sides in early spring in hopes of restarting formal talks to resolve one of the world’s most intractable conflicts.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Cyprus “must continue on the path of a two-state solution” and that expending efforts on other arrangements ending Cyprus’ half-century divide would be “a waste of time.”
Fidan spoke to reporters after talks with Ersin Tatar, leader of the breakaway Turkish Cypriots whose declaration of independence in 1983 in Cyprus’ northern third is recognized only by Türkiye.
Cyprus’ ethnic division occurred in 1974 when Türkiye invaded in the wake of a coup, sponsored by the junta then ruling Greece, that aimed to unite the island in the eastern Mediterranean with the Greek state.
The most recent major push for a peace deal collapsed in 2017.
Since then, Türkiye has advocated for a two-state arrangement in which the numerically fewer Turkish Cypriots would never be the minority in any power-sharing arrangement.
But Greek Cypriots do not support a two-state deal that they see as formalizing the island’s partition and perpetuating what they see as a threat of a permanent Turkish military presence on the island.
Greek Cypriot officials have maintained that the 2017 talks collapsed primarily on Türkiye’s insistence on permanently keeping at least some of its estimated 35,000 troops currently in the island's breakaway north, and on enshrining military intervention rights in any new peace deal.
The UN the European Union and others have rejected a two-state deal for Cyprus, saying the only way forward is a federation agreement with Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot zones.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is preparing to host an informal meeting in Switzerland in March to hear what each side envisions for a peace deal. Last year, an envoy Guterres dispatched to Cyprus reportedly concluded that there's no common ground for a return to talks.
The island’s Greek Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides says he’s ready to resume formal talks immediately but has ruled out any discussion on a two-state arrangement.
Tatar, leader of the breakaway Turkish Cypriots, said the meeting will bring together the two sides in Cyprus, the foreign ministers of “guarantor powers” Greece and Türkiye and a senior British official to chart “the next steps” regarding Cyprus’ future.
A peace deal would not only remove a source of instability in the eastern Mediterranean, but could also expedite the development of natural gas deposits inside Cyprus' offshore economic zone that Türkiye disputes.