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The Progressive Party of Working People (Greek: Ανορθωτικό Κόμμα Εργαζόμενου Λαού, Anorthotikó Kómma Ergazómenou Laoú, AKEL; Turkish: Emekçi Halkın İlerici Partisi) is a communist party in Cyprus. It says that it supports an independent, demilitarized and non-aligned Cyprus, and a federal solution of the internal aspect of the Cyprus problem. It places particular emphasis on rapprochement with the Turkish Cypriots. It supported entry into the European Union with certain reservations. AKEL also supported the Annan Plan in 2004, but at the end they decided for a negative response, since they did not have time to support the plan, but also because they knew that people in Cyprus would never accept such a plan. KKE, the communist party of Greece, in constrast to AKEL, strongly rejected the plan saying that it supported British and American interests. History It was founded in 1926 with the name Communist Party of Cyprus (CPC). The communist party set as its aim not only the struggle against what it viewed as exploitation but also the independence of Cyprus from British rule. The party became illegal in 1931 when the British colonial government imposed restrictions on civil rights following a nationalist riot. In 1941, leading members of the underground communist party and others founded AKEL. In the first municipal elections in 1943 (before that mayors were appointed) AKEL candidates became mayors of Mouttagiakka (Ploutis Servas) and Stroubi (Adam Adamantos). List of general secretaries: * 1936-1945 Giannakis Patsalos Unlike its predecessor, AKEL was not against Enosis. Instead AKEL supported a gradual process, starting off with a constitution and self-government while Cyprus would remain a colony, leading to self-determination and Enosis. After the failure of the consultative assembly in 1949 to grant a constitution acceptable to the Cypriot members, AKEL changed line, supporting immediate Enosis with no intermediate stages. During the late fifties, AKEL was opposed to the violent tactics followed by the anti-British resistance movement of EOKA. EOKA accused AKEL as collaborators of the British, even though AKEL was also illegal since 1955. Several AKEL members were assassinated by EOKA at the time as "traitors," including AKEL-supporter Savas Menikou who was stoned to death. AKEL denounced EOKA's leadership as being anti-communist, as its leader George Grivas had fought against the communist side during the Greek Civil War. Grivas later founded EOKA B, which supported the 1974 coup d'état following his death. About 1958, the Turkish Cypriot nationalist organization TMT started forcing Turkish Cypriots members of AKEL to leave. Editor of a workers newspaper Fazil Onder was killed and the head of the Turkish bureau of PEO (AKEL's trade union) Ahmet Sadi moved to the UK to save his life. In the first presidential elections for independent Cyprus, AKEL backed Ioannis Kliridis (father of Glafkos Klerides) against Makarios III. The last Turkish Cypriot to be a member of the central committee of AKEL, Derviş Ali Kavazoğlu, was killed by TMT in 1965. In the mid 1990s the U.S. State Department estimated the party membership to be approximately 10,000 (3.25% of the working age population).[3] Recent At the legislative elections on 27 May 2001, the party won 34.7% of the popular vote and 20 out of 56 seats. After this election, AKEL's General Secretary, Dimitris Christofias, was elected as President of the House of Representatives and until 2006, for first time in the History of Republic of Cyprus. Besides AKEL, he was supported by Movement for Social Democracy (EDEK) and Democratic Party (DIKO). It is a member of the European United Left - Nordic Green Left in the European Parliament and it is considered as moderately eurosceptic. Cyprus joined the EU in 2004. In the last European election, AKEL elected 2 members; Adamos Adamou and Kyriacos Triantaphyllides. AKEL remained the largest political party on the island in the 2006 Cypriot legislative elections, however the party lost two seats in the parliament winning 18 seats with 32.3% of the votes). In the second round presidential election held on 24 February 2008, General Secretary of AKEL Dimitris Christofias was elected President of the Republic of Cyprus. Official figures showed a win of 53.36% of the vote against his right-wing opponent Ioannis Kasoulidis' 46.64%.[4] On 21 January 2009 Antros Kyprianou was elected general secretary of the party with 54.3% in the central committee election. AKEL MPs * 2007-Ongoing Dina Akkelidou AKEL MEPs * 2004-2009 Andreas Lemonis See also * Co-ordinating Committee of Communist Parties in Britain References 1. ^ ""Cyprus gets ready for a communist 'takeover'"". The Observer. 24 February 2008. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/feb/24/cyprus. External links * AKEL's website in English (Greek, English and Turkish)
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