Turkish invasion of Cyprus

].

Invasion and occupation

1963-1974

Between 21 and 26 December 1963 the conflict centred in the Omorphita suburb of Nicosia, which had been an area of tension back in 1958. The participants now were Greek Cypriot irregulars and Turkish Cypriot paramilitaries, and numbers of civilians who were caught in the crossfire and chaos that ensued over the Christmas week. Both President Makarios and Dr Kucuk issued calls of peace, but they were ignored. Meanwhile, within a week of the violence flaring up, the Turkish army contingent had moved out of its barracks and seized the most strategic position on the island across the Nicosia to Kyrenia road, the historic jugular vein of the island. So crucial was this road to Turkish strategic thinking that they retained control of that road until 1974, at which time it acted as a crucial link in Turkey’s military invasion. From 1963 up to the point of the Turkish invasion of 20 July 1974, Greek Cypriots who wanted to use the road could only do so if accompanied by a UN convoy,. It was, however, a baffling strategy for protecting the Turkish Cypriot minority. Again, this demonstrated the true motivation of Turkey.

Thereafter Turkey once again put forward the idea of partition. The intensified attacks on the Turkish speaking population, which led to 24 Turks being killed, together with their claims that there had been a violation of the constitution, were used as ground for intervention. And quoting past treaties, Turkey hinted at a possible intervention on the island. US president Johnson stated, in his famous letter of June 5, 1964, that the US was against a possible intervention on the island, warning Turkey in a “bitter tone”. One month later, within the framework of a plan prepared by the US Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Dean Acheson, negotiations with Greece and Turkey began.

Now a secretive organisation and going by the name of EOKA-B, in the

Humanitarian issues

    Links

  • 20 July 1974

Books

  • Brendan O'Malley and Ian Craig, "The Cyprus Conspiracy" (London: IB Tauris, 1999)
  • Christopher Hitchens, "Hostage to History: Cyprus from the Ottomans to Kissinger" (New York: Verso, 1997)
  • Christopher Hitchens, "The Trial of Henry Kissinger" (Verso, 2001)
  • Christopher Hitchens, "Cyprus" (Quartet, 1984)
  • Christopher Brewin, "European Union and Cyprus" (Huntingdon: Eothen Press, 2000)
  • Claude Nicolet, "United States Policy Towards Cyprus, 1954-1974" (Mannheim: Bibliopolis, 2001)
  • Dudley Barker, "Grivas, Portrait of a Terrorist" (New York Harcourt: Brace and Company 2005)
  • Farid Mirbagheri, "Cyprus and International Peacemaking" (London: Hurst, 1989)
  • James Ker-Lindsay, "EU Accession and UN Peacemaking in Cyprus" (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005)
  • Nancy Cranshaw, "The Cyprus Revolt: An Account of the Struggle for Union with Greece" (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1978)
  • Oliver Richmond, "Mediating in Cyprus" (London: Frank Cass, 1998)
  • The Lobby for Cyprus study group, Cyprus: Origins of the present crisis - 1950s to 1970s
  • Athanasios Strigas, "Kypros: Aporritos Fakelos"
  • Athanasios Strigas, "Diethneis Synomotes"
  • Christos P. Ioannides, "In Turkey's image: The transformation of occupied Cyprus into a Turkish province", (New Rochelle, NY: Caratzas, 1991)

Other sources

  • ITN documentary, Cyprus, Britain’s Grim Legacy
  • TV documentary, Antonis Angastiniotis, Voice of Blood

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