Stark divide on show as Cyprus marks 50 years since invasion
NICOSIA: Cyprus on Saturday marked 50 years since Turkish troops invaded the Mediterranean island, with comments from the Turkish and Cypriot leaders demonstrating the stark divide that remains. The Greek-Cypriot president of Cyprus, who seeks a bi-zonal, bi-communal federation under a UN framework, said there was no other option but reunification.
But in an address at about the same time on the other side of a UN-patrolled buffer zone, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan rejected a federal solution and said he saw no point in continuing UN-led negotiations on the island’s future. As dawn broke in the internationally recognized south of the island, sirens wailed at 5:30 am (0230 GMT), the time that Operation Atilla began in 1974. The invasion led to the conquering of onethird of Cyprus and displacement of about 40 percent of the population. The buffer zone, where abandoned buildings crumble, cuts across the island with border controls separating Greek Cypriots in the south from Turkish Cypriots in the north.
The United Nations says around 40,000 Turkish soldiers also remain in the north. Decades of UN-backed talks have failed to reunify the island, and the last round collapsed in 2017 after meetings in Crans-Montana, Switzerland. “We believe that a federal solution is not possible in Cyprus. It is of no benefit to anyone to say let’s continue negotiations where we left off in Switzerland years ago,” Erdogan said in the self-proclaimed Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), which is only recognized by Ankara. “The Turkish Cypriot side should sit at the table as equals with the Greek Cypriot side. We are ready to negotiate and achieve lasting peace and a solution,” he said before watching a parade that included marching bands and armored military vehicles.
Turkish and TRNC flags flew side-by-side.
On the other side of Nicosia, the world’s last divided capital, President Nikos Christodoulides unveiled busts of officers killed in the fighting. He also laid a wreath at a war memorial where ceremonial gunfire sounded. “Whatever Mr Erdogan and his representatives in the occupied areas do or say, Turkey, 50 years later, continues to be responsible for the violation of human rights of the entire Cypriot people and for the violation of international law,” Christodoulides told reporters. Decades on, fresh tears flowed for those who died during the invasion.
Under a hot sun at the war memorial, a mother clad in black cried over the tomb of her son. She ran her hand gently over a photo of the young man attached to a marble cross. Other women wiped their eyes nearby. Greek flags waved on graves that stretched out in rows around them as mourners placed flowers and incense. More than 750 Greek Cypriots and almost 200 Turkish Cypriots remain missing, says the bi-communal Committee on Missing Persons in Cyprus which tries to find and return their remains to loved ones.
Before the anniversary, some Greek Cypriot veterans of the fight against the invasion told AFP they saw no hope for reunification. “Perhaps, what was completely broken in 1974, cannot be fixed,” the English-language Cyprus Mail newspaper wrote in an editorial Saturday. “They probably consider reunification too big a risk to take,” it said, and most people on both side “have no experience other than that of a divided country.”