Restoring respect in Cyprus

June 4, 2016

The Cyprus Weekly and Havadis interviewed Limassol mayor Andreas Christou after his initiative to restore a Turkish Cypriot cemetery where 23 graves – of those fallen in 1974 – were restored in the garden of Arnavut Mosque in the town

By Esra Aygin
Can you tell us why you took this step to restore the cemetery?
Andreas Christou: First of all, I believe that there should be respect towards the monuments – all monuments of any community of Cyprus. We must respect the monuments even when they do not agree with our ideology or our political approach. A monument is a monument and must be respected. And so I am against any demolition or any vandalism against any monument in any place of the world. So this is for me a question of principle.

Did you receive any criticism or nationalist attacks?
AC: No not so far. These are tombs of people who died during very difficult and dark days of our history. Always we have to respect people who died. We have to respect the dead. It’s a lesson from ancient Greek history. They stopped the fighting to bury their dead. It’s something that cannot be ignored by anybody. So there were no nationalist attacks, no negative reaction.
We did this with the initiative of the Limassol Cultural Foundation and we informed the Ministry of Interior. The tomb stones were delivered by the foundation because we cannot produce such things in Limassol. All were delivered from the Turkish Cypriot side with the plaques of them and photos. And builders came. We provided them with two of our builders and all necessary equipment so that they could level the surface and place the tomb stones and improve the situation in this place.
And this is not the first time we have repaired or taken measures to protect the cemeteries of Turkish Cypriots in Limassol. We have done it three times.

Until you became mayor no care was shown to these places?
AC: No. There was no initiative.

Was it difficult to get the permission of the Interior Ministry for any of these?
AC: No.
We also rebuilt the Pir Ali Dede Tekkesi. This was done when I was interior minister.
This is a very important religious monument for Turkish Cypriots.

Do you think such steps have a positive impact on negotiations?
AC: Not negotiations necessarily. Such steps improve the way people look to the other side. They give people the hope that there might be a peaceful future. The older generation can remember the time when the two communities were living side by side, altogether in the same villages, in the same cities. So it is important for us to continue.

http://in-cyprus.com/restoring-respect-in-cyprus/

CYPRUS – RETRIEVING THE PAST

ESRA AYGIN

Limassol – ASSOCIATED PRESS

24 June 2003, Tuesday 00:00

* EDITOR'S NOTE: Esra Aygin, a 23-year-old Turkish Cypriot journalist, crossed over to the Greek Cypriot south of Cyprus for the first time after Turkish Cypriot leaders eased a nearly 30-year travel ban. This is the account of her trip to her father's hometown in the south.

"Ozel, I knew you would come," shouted Andonis as he warmly hugged my father, who still couldn't believe he had found the man who saved him almost 30 years ago.

"You lost your hair," my father said, examining Andonis with curious eyes. "You got fat, Ozel," he replied, tapping my father's big belly. They had last seen each other in September 1974, when my parents fled their house in the southern city of Limassol for northern Cyprus after a Turkish invasion drove Turkish and Greek Cypriots to opposite sides of the island.

Last month, the Turkish Cypriot leadership eased a ban it had imposed on travel between the two sides, prompting more than 300,000 Greek and Turkish Cypriots to cross the line dividing Cyprus and visit their old houses and friends for the first time since the Turkish invasion.

My parents and I were among them. My father, now 65, always avoided talking about the clashes between Turkish and Greek Cypriots and the ensuing Turkish invasion. But the night before we went to Limassol, he told me about Andonis. As Turkish troops landed in Cyprus on July 20, 1974, the Turkish Cypriots in Limassol, including my parents and then 9-year-old brother, were detained by Greek Cypriot soldiers.

"We had no idea what was going to happen to us," said my mother, Yucel. "People were crying and begging the soldiers to let them free." After the family spent a night in custody, a Greek Cypriot soldier recognized my father as the physical therapist who had treated him some years before. "He drove us back home," my father told me. "And he told us not to leave the house. He was back at night with a basket with bread, cheese and a bottle of milk."

Adonis Ioannou, the young Greek Cypriot soldier, had risked his life to help my Turkish Cypriot family. My father hid for several days in fear of being rounded up again. It was a time when many people disappeared some in custody of Greek Cypriot soldiers _and my father sometimes wonders what would have happened had he not encountered Andonis.

About 1,000 Turkish Cypriots and some 1,500 Greek Cypriots are still listed as missing from fighting between the two sides in the 1960s and during the invasion, which was prompted by a short-lived coup by Greek Cypriot supporters of union with Greece. About 3,000 people were killed during those troubled times.

Nearly 200,000 Greek Cypriots from the north and 40,000 Turkish Cypriots from the south were displaced and divided by the "Green Line" that cuts across the Mediterranean island, home to nearly 1 million people, mostly Greek Cypriots. My father hid in the trunk of a Greek Cypriot's car to flee to the North. A British couple took my brother over the line, acting as if he were their son.

My mother pretended to be Greek Cypriot, burying her nose in a Greek newspaper as she crossed north in a car.

The easing of the travel ban was widely seen as an attempt to appease Turkish Cypriots frustrated at the collapse in March of talks on reunifying the island. Although Cyprus will join the European Union next year, the benefits of membership will apply only to the Greek Cypriot south and won't be extended to the Turkish-controlled north until Cyprus is again united.

Tens of thousands of Turkish Cypriots, including my parents, had taken to the streets to urge the leader of the breakaway Turkish Cypriot state, Rauf Denktash, to accept a U.N.-sponsored reunification plan. The state in the north is only recognized by Turkey, which maintains 40,000 troops on the island. It was an unnerving one-hour drive from the checkpoint in divided Nicosia to Limassol _ my first time in the Greek Cypriot south.

It was also the first time I saw my usually cheerful father crying like a helpless child as he stood on a wooden bridge across from the one-story house where he grew up. The house was gone, replaced by multistory apartment buildings.

My mother held on to him as they slowly and silently walked back to the car. "I feel like I have lost my childhood," my father told me later. "That house is gone, taking with it all my memories."

We stopped at a coffee shop to ask if any of the elderly customers knew Andonis. My father could only remember his first name _ and that his family had owned a grocery store.

After chatting in a combination of Greek and English over thick Cypriot coffee, a man offered to take us to Andonis.

He had been waiting for us. "I saw in my dream that you would be back," he said. "I had the same dream four times. This is a dream come true."

"This has been the best day of my life in the last 30 years," my father said as we slowly walked toward the checkpoint at the end of the day with two huge bottles of famous Cyprus wine and a camera full of photographs.

My mother, who grew up in a village called Moniatis on the Greek Cypriot part of the island, took a deep breath as if trying to trap the air of the "other side" in her lungs before reaching the checkpoint. She was 32 when she fled from the south.

"They stole 30 years from my life," she said, referring to the politicians' maneuverings that led to the island's decades-long division.

Reflecting on my parents' emotional return, I found myself recalling a Turkish Cypriot poem:

"My father tells me to love my country, But my country has been divided in two. Which side am I to love?"

Then I remembered what Andonis told my father: "We waited for peace for 30 years, Ozel. We can wait for another two or three."

Article - The real heroes of Cyprus (Published in Greek in 24h on 27 July 2014)

The real heroes of Cyprus

I watch in terror as the fighter jets rip the sky to mark the anniversary of Turkey’s military operation in Cyprus. They are here to celebrate, to remind the heroism, to mark the pride... My ears are deafened with their sound and I wonder how anyone can ever find this vulgar display of aggression entertaining. My blood freezes. I am petrified…

“I think it was a Saturday. We were in Tessera Fanarga in Limassol. All we heard were the sounds of mortars and guns… Mortars were being fired down on us continuously. So many of them, everywhere” said my father of the morning of 20 July 1974. “We were at the mercy of Greek Cypriots. And Greek Cypriots were at the mercy of Turkey.”  

The Turkish Prime Minister of the day – Bulent Ecevit, during the extraordinary parliamentary session on 20 July 1974 at the Turkish Grand National Assembly, had said: “This is a move not aimed at war but aimed at peace; to bring peace and freedom not only to Turks, but to all the people of the island, and not to seize a state but to re-establish a collapsed state on just foundations.”

Unfortunately, every step Turkey took after that day proved the opposite. Turkey was not here to re-establish the Republic of Cyprus but a new state of affairs. Turkey was here to stay…

A great show was put on last Sunday, complete with fighter jets and tanks. The TV overflew with endless outbursts of heroism, pride and fanaticism. And any Turkish Cypriot daring enough to criticise Turkey’s post- military operation policies, the “celebrations” or the status-quo, were called a number of names ranging from “ungrateful” to “bastard of Greeks” and were told to “go live in the south.”

I have found these celebrations, these outbursts of heroism nauseating ever since I was a kid. I have always believed that the real heroes of Cyprus are those, who keep silent. Those, who have suffered the most, who carried the real burden of all the painful events that ever happened in Cyprus, and those who still so faithfully long for a solution in Cyprus…

One of those mortars, being fired down on the Turkish Cypriot district of Limassol on that Saturday morning, 20 July 1974, fell within a couple of meters of my uncle – my father’s younger brother. He didn’t have time to escape. He suffered a major injury on his spinal cord. Last Sunday was also the 40^th anniversary of him becoming paralysed from his waist down and becoming confined to a wheelchair. It was also the 40^th anniversary of him, standing up for peace in Cyprus every day of his paralysed life. He was not among those shouting stories of heroism or cheering the fighter jets last Sunday. He was among those, who shut their windows to not hear the terrifying sound of war. To me, he is the real hero of Cyprus.

Article - We need to start telling the beautiful stories (Published in Greek in 24h on 20 July 2014)

We need to start telling the beautiful stories

There are terrible stories that can be told about 20 July 1974. Stories of war, bloodshed and fear. But today, I choose to tell you a beautiful story. A beautiful, true story I wrote in May 2003 when I was a 23-year-old journalist working for the Associated Press. The crossing points had just opened and we had gone to Limassol, together with my father and late mother to find Antonis, who had risked his life to help my family in July 1974.

May 2003

"Özel, I knew you would come," shouted Antonis as he warmly hugged my father, who still couldn't believe he had found the man who saved him almost 30 years ago.

"You lost your hair," my father said, examining Antonis with curious eyes. "You got fat, Özel," he replied, tapping my father's big belly. They had last seen each other in September 1974, when my parents fled their house in Limassol to come to Kyrenia.

My father had told me about Antonis the night before we went to Limassol. As Turkish troops landed in Cyprus on Saturday, July 20, 1974, the Turkish Cypriots in Limassol, including my parents and then 9-year-old brother, were detained by Greek Cypriot soldiers. My brother was sick, very scared and terribly weak.

"We had no idea what was going to happen to us," said my mother. "People were crying and begging the soldiers to let them free." My parents spent the night under detention at Yousoufidis’ clinic along with a large group of Turkish Cypriots living in Limassol. The next morning, Antonis, a young Greek Cypriot soldier recognized my father as the physical therapist, who had treated him some years before. "He rushed us into his jeep. Before taking us home, he drove to a doctor’s clinic, where he had your brother examined. He bought the medicines prescribed by the doctor and took us to our home," my father told me. "And he told us not to leave the house for a couple of days before things got calmer. He was back at night with a basket with bread, cheese and a bottle of milk." …

On arriving at Limassol that day, almost 30 years after my parents had fled the city, we stopped at a coffee shop to ask if any of the customers knew Antonis. My father could only remember his first name - and that his family had owned a grocery store. An elderly man recognised who we were talking about and offered to take us to his house.

It is unbelievable, but Antonis had been waiting for us. "I saw in my dream that you would be back," he shouted from his balcony after we rang the doorbell. "I had the same dream four times. This is a dream come true."

Article - Feelings of a Turkish Cypriot (Published in Greek in 24h newspaper in April 2014)

Esra Aygin

I am the daughter of a refugee family from Limassol. I was born five years after my parents fled to the north in the summer of 1974. Nevertheless, my heart bleeds every time I go to Limassol, exactly the same way a refugee from Kyrenia hurts when visiting Kyrenia. And how can one feel so in-place and so foreign at the same time? How can one feel so much pity, and at the same time, anger towards her parents for leaving their hometown?

My first memories of Kyrenia have an armed Turkish soldier at the corner of our street, who used to stick his tongue out every time I passed by. It wasn’t until years later that it occurred to me to ask my father what an armed Turkish soldier was doing on our street. Apparently, that was one of the many checkpoints the Turkish army had within cities, where they randomly stopped and interrogated people.

My family never felt more Turkish than they felt Cypriot, and resented everyone and everything that caused Cyprus to be torn apart. Sampson and Denktash the same… Turkey and Greece the same… EOKA and TMT the same….

While my brother dropped out of university because he was sick and tired of the Turkish soldier pointing his gun at him every single morning as he was walking down the street to catch a bus – and one morning the soldier actually pulled the trigger, which was the final straw for my brother -  I had to recite the Turkish national oath at school every Monday and Friday and learn Turkish history and geography. I was not taught about the Troodos mountains, but knew the name of every single river in Turkey. I was not taught about the shared history of Cyprus but the Turkish revolution.

And I guess it was around then when I started having my share of the identity crisis that is so common to all Turkish Cypriots …

“What do Greek Cypriots look like?” I remember asking my mother; not being able to conceive as a little girl, that those, who had 'committed so many evils' - as I was taught at school - could look like human beings.

As I grew older, I found out that Turkish Cypriots committed many evils too and that Greek Cypriots also suffered indescribable pain. I found out that there were many more Greek Cypriots, who helped Turkish Cypriots during the troublesome times of 1963 and 1974, than who hurt them, and vice versa. I found out that Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots together, are the real victims of a very sad history. And I realised in terror, the grave lack of understanding of and empathy about the other side’s pain and suffering.

Going back to being a Turkish Cypriot… For the majority of Turks from Turkey, Turkish Cypriots are simply Turks. “I am from Cyprus. – Oh, so you are a Turk! – No, I am a Turkish Cypriot. – Ok, so you are a Turk then, no?” the conversation goes. They don’t understand why you would make a distinction or insist that you are a Cypriot. And this reaction is rarely ill-intentioned or deliberate, but simply because of a lack of knowledge and interest.

The conversation with most Greek Cypriots is not necessarily uncomplicated either. “Where are you from? - I am from Cyprus. Ah milas ellinika! - No I don’t speak Greek – But why? You are from Cyprus!” And they don’t do this deliberately either. The intention is not to discriminate or humiliate. It is a natural reaction often displayed with honest astonishment and without much thought.

So, I don’t feel like a Turk and I am not a ‘proper’ Cypriot since I don’t speak Greek… Then, who am I?

Well, I know this much: I am a Turkish Cypriot, who believes that Cyprus should be one; who realises that we all had enough suffering, and that the status-quo is shameful, unacceptable and a utter humiliation to each and every one of us. I am a human being, who believes that all human beings are equal and therefore, Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriots are equal too. I am a pacifist, who believes that we can do much better than bickering over who is to blame and who suffered more. I am a mother, who believes that Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot children are beautiful all the same, and that they deserve much better than this...