By Michele Kambas
NICOSIA (Reuters) -Air raid sirens wailed throughout Cyprus’s divided capital Nicosia at daybreak on Saturday as Greek Cypriots mourned, and Turkish Cypriots celebrated, 50 years since Turkey invaded a part of the island in response to a quick Greek-inspired coup.
The ethnically cut up island is a persistent supply of rigidity between Greece and Turkey, that are each companions in NATO however are at odds over quite a few points.
Their variations had been laid naked on Saturday, with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan attending a celebratory navy parade in north Nicosia to mark the day in 1974 when Turkish forces launched an offensive that they name a “peace operation”.
Later within the day, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis was as a result of attend an occasion within the south of the town to commemorate what Greeks generally discuss with because the “barbaric Turkish invasion”.
Mitsotakis posted a picture of a blood-stained map of Cyprus on his LinkedIn web page with the phrases “Half a century since the national tragedy of Cyprus”.
There was jubilation within the north.
“The Cyprus Peace Operation saved Turkish Cypriots from cruelty and brought them to freedom,” Erdogan mentioned, criticising the south for having a “spoiled mentality” and seeing itself as the only ruler of Cyprus.
However Erdogan left open a window to dialogue in deadlocked negotiations. “We are ready for negotiations, to meet, and to establish long-term peace and resolution in Cyprus,” he mentioned.
Peace talks at the moment are stalled at two seemingly irreconcilable ideas – Greek Cypriots need reunification as a federation. Turkish Cypriots need a two-state settlement.
Cyprus gained independence from Britain in 1960, however a shared administration between Greek and Turkish Cypriots shortly fell aside in violence that noticed Turkish Cypriots withdraw into enclaves and led to the dispatch of a U.N. peacekeeping power.
The disaster left Greek Cypriots working the internationally recognised Republic of Cyprus, a member of the European Union since 2004 with the potential to derail Turkey’s personal decades-long aspirations of becoming a member of the bloc.
REMEMBERING THE DEAD
Cypriot President Nikos Christodoulides, whose workplace represents the Greek Cypriot neighborhood within the reunification dialogue, mentioned the anniversary was a sombre event for reflection and for remembering the useless.
“Our mission is liberation, reunification and solving the Cyprus problem,” he mentioned. “If we really want to send a message on this tragic anniversary … it is to do anything possible to reunite Cyprus.”
Turkey, he mentioned, continued to be answerable for violating human rights and worldwide legislation over Cyprus.
Throughout the south, church companies had been held to recollect the greater than 3,000 individuals who died within the Turkish invasion.
“It was a betrayal of Cyprus and so many kids were lost. It wasn’t just my son, it was many,” mentioned Loukas Alexandrou, 90, as he tended the grave of his son at a navy cemetery.
In Turkey, state tv focussed on violence in opposition to Turkish Cypriots previous to the invasion, significantly on bloodshed in 1963-64 and in 1967.
Turkey’s invasion took greater than a 3rd of the island and expelled greater than 160,000 Greek Cypriots to the south.
Reunification talks collapsed in 2017 and have been at a stalemate since. Northern Cyprus is a breakaway state recognised solely by Turkey, and its Turkish Cypriot management desires worldwide recognition.
