What is something that you want people to know about Cyprus? Cyprus is... Cyprus has the last divided capital in the world. The problem is much more complicated than it actually seems. name is Orestis. I am 22 years old and I'm a Greek Cypriot. I also study medicine in the European University of Cyprus. My name is Sude, I'm from Northern Cyprus. I'm Turkish Cypriot. I'm 22 years old and I'm studying medical sciences and political sciences. We don't have any H&M, McDonald's or any known brands, any international brands here, because we're basically under an occupation regime. I don't have any friends from the other side, but it's not something that came to me because I didn't want any issues. I haven't crossed that many times on the other side. I don't like the fact that I have to show my I.D., but it's not going to keep me from going there. Welcome to Cyprus, one of the most desired islands in the world,.
Perfectly located at the crossroads between Northern Africa, Europe, and the Middle East.
Over the course of history, empire after Empire fought for its control. Today, Cyprus is a republic where four powers coexist: the Republic of Cyprus, The occupied territory of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.
Two military bases owned by the United Kingdom and an area designed to keep the peace, controlled by the United Nations since the ceasefire in 1974. My maternal grandmother is from Paphos, so she was forced to come to Nicosia in the 1974 events. So that was a bit traumatic. I've heard lots and lots of times the stories of my mother having to wake up one day because there were planes and tanks rolling in, and the panic in the village and how they had to leave everything behind, basically jump on a fully packed bus and leave. They were basically homeless for some time, living in tents like no house, no money, nothing. Everything was lost during the war. This is the lost generation. Like in my mother's era they had no contact with the Greek speaking Cypriots because of that ceasefire line, because of that border, so they couldn't pass from side to side. There was a time when Greek and Turkish Cypriots were not enemies. During the ruling of the Ottoman Empire, which began in 1571, the Greek majority and the newly settled Turkish minority lived in relative harmony. It's only after 1878, when the British Empire took control of the island, that the competing imperial interests fueled ethnic divisions, pushing the communities towards a conflict. In my grandparents era, they always used to live in mixed villages. So like both of my grandparents are bilingual, they both speak Turkish and Greek. My mother never told me anything bad about the Turkish Cypriots that she was living with. She told me that they were living totally in harmony, peacefully. Most of them just spoke Greek, so there wasn't much of a division even then. Towards the end of the British ruling, Greek and Turkish communities had different plans for the island.
The Greek wanted to become part of mainland Greece, a process called Enosis. While Turkish Cypriots, who felt no particular link with mainland Turkey, sought a partition of the island into Taksim. At this point, the British Empire decided to give everyone exactly what they didn't ask for, which was independence. In 1960, the Republic of Cyprus became an independent country, but the process was far from peaceful. Together with Turkey and Greece, Britain came to a set up that would have Cyprus be independent, while allowing the UK to maintain sovereign military bases in the country.
The new Republic would feature a Greek president and a Turkish vice president, and the constitution gave Britain, Greece and Turkey the right to keep armed forces on the island ready to intervene in the event of a threat to the new order. And that order didn't last long. Nationalist Greek Cypriots unhappy with a constitution they had had no voice in started rioting in 1963. The violence killed hundreds and forced Turkish Cypriots to gather in enclaves around the country. Peace talks keep tensions at bay for around a decade until 1974, when a coup led by Greek Cypriots and the military junta overthrew the government.
This led to a Turkish military intervention and escalated a civil war between the two communities.
Turkey took control of northern Cyprus, which led 160,000 Greek Cypriots to flee and escape, including Orestis' family. Soon after, Turkey proclaimed the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, a de facto state only recognized by Turkey and considered by the international community as an illegal occupation. I don't have the citizenship of Turkey. I don't have the citizenship of Cyprus.
I only have the citizenship of TRNC, which is not a recognised country.
So I feel like I'm stuck. I feel like I'm lost, actually. It says TRNC here. It's what I need to show at the Turkish side so I can pass to the buffer zone. Sude is talking about the Green Line, a border stretching across 180 kilometers, dividing in two Cyprus and its capital, Nicosia. It's not really a border, though. It's a demilitarised buffer zone patrolled by the United Nations peacekeeping forces, hastily droned by the U.N. in 1974 to stop the violence between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots. Access is still forbidden to both communities, leaving a space that has remained frozen in time. I can easily cross the checkpoint to Republic of Cyprus, but since I only have TRNC identity and passport, I cannot go abroad. I can get Turkish identity and Turkish passport but I don't want to get a Turkish identity or a Turkish passport because I don't feel like I belong in Turkey.
I have never been to Turkey in my whole life, so why am I forced to get the citizenship of a country where, like, I didn't even live? I need to cross the border to have a coffee from Starbucks, or to shop from H&M. Like, this is normal for us but I don't think that this should be the normal. So I want the Republic of Cyprus identity. In 2003, the first checkpoint between the two areas was opened. It was the first time people could go visit their home since the war. Lots of people don't want to cross because they don't want to legitimise any occupation. Understandable.
But I still believe you better cross because if you abandon it, then it's gone forever.
My family goes at least once, twice per year. They go to my mother's village. They see her home. And I've also recently decided to go because I feel like if you abandon your heritage, you just let it be someone else's. But if you go there, you're still claiming it. My grandmother, as I said before, was from Paphos, and she was moved in 1974. 30 years later, it was her first time to see her own village, the village that she was born in. In 2024, the Republic of Cyprus will celebrate 20 years since joining the European Union. Personally, I would identify as a Greek Cypriot, but that wouldn't necessarily mean that I feel as a Greek from Greece. I'm still a Greek, but from a different place. I feel like I'm a Cypriot, I'm a European. And being a European and feeling like living in a European Union country is a different thing in my own opinion.
All Turkish Cypriots feel like Europeans, but because of the occupation here in the north of Cyprus, we are not actually living in a country of the European Union. Rather than ethnic differences, it's the competing interests of foreign governments that keep the island divided, leaving ordinary Cypriots to pay the price. There's this flag on the Pentadaktylos mountain range, and it's both the Turkish flag and the flag of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. And below there is a motto, saying something along the lines of how proud is one to be called a Turk. you can basically see that from any tall building in Nicosia, I can see it from my own apartment balcony. It's provocative, definitely, and kind of insulting. But what can we do about it? Even as a member of the European Union, I feel like the Cyprus problem reveals hypocrisy that lots of countries, every country is taking part in. Because as a small country, as a country that's supposed to be like part of the European family, we can still see that there's a problem that remains unsolved. And also, Turkey is a candidate for the European Union while still occupying a part of Cyprus, that doesn't seem fair. Turkish Cypriots are now a minority even in the occupied north. There is no official census, but it's estimated that indigenous Cypriots are less than half of the Turkish nationals today. Turkey speaking Cypriots are in danger right now. There are lots of illegal settlers coming from Turkey and they're just assimilating us. We're about to lose our culture. We're about to lose our tradition. Regardless of ethnic roots, the future is uncertain on both sides of the border. We can 't take peace for granted all the time. We don't know what the next ten years will have in store for us.
I think the Cyprus problem is playing a very important role in any young person's decision to stay or leave the country because it's definitely a safety problem for all of us. I can leave if I obtain the Turkish passport, but I really don't want to leave Cyprus because I love Cyprus. This is my country. This is where I belong. So I just need to stay here and fight for our independence. But I don't feel like I can live under the occupation regime anymore because day by day it's getting really hard to live under the embargoes here.
So I just want to leave in the Republic of Cyprus. My dream for my country would be to finally achieve a solution, have the occupation army leave the country, have independence for both communities and have a strong direction towards democracy, freedom, prosperity... like the European Union. Since when I was a child, I always wanted a united Cyprus. I want the reunification of my own island.
