NICOSIA -- Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul will pay a one-day visit to northern Cyprus today for talks with Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash on the future of the divided island, the Turkish Cypriot TAK news agency reported.

During his brief six-hour stay in the breakaway Turkish Republic of North Cyprus (TRNC), Gul will also meet with other officials, as well as representatives from opposition parties and nongovernmental organizations which favored a failed UN peace plan, AFP reported.

Earlier in the week, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced his government would launch its own bid to settle the Cyprus question, and would send Gul to the island to outline the plan.

Gul's visit coincides with a move by Denktash to offer concessions to rival Greek Cypriots in a bid to lift an international embargo on his breakaway state.

Greek Cypriot leader Tassos Papadopoulos on Thursday rejected the offer, saying any new talks must be based on the UN blueprint.

But Denktash announced Friday he had sent a second letter to Papadopoulos, asking him to reconsider his proposals, which include handing over the battered frontier town of Varosha, increasing trade between the two sides and granting freedom of movement across the UN-manned "green line" dividing the island.

"My proposals are still on the table," Denktash told a press conference in the Turkish-held sector of Nicosia. Cyprus has been split since July 1974 when Turkish troops occupied the northern third of the island in response to a Greek Cypriot coup that sought to unite the island with Greece.