Cyprus president says he won't run for 2nd term

NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) -- Cyprus President Dimitris Christofias says he will not seek re-election for a second term because there is little hope that long-running talks with breakaway Turkish Cypriots to reunify the ethnically split island will succeed when his tenure expires in February next year.

Christofias said in a nationally televised address on Monday that his decision fulfills an earlier promise not to run for a second term if the peace talks weren't close to an accord.

The 66-year-old, Soviet-educated Christofias is the first incumbent president not to seek re-election since the island gained independence from British colonial rule in 1960.