This was the catchphrase of the Greek Cypriots between the years 1960 to 2017 in Cyprus.
The Greek Cypriots and Greeks, who leaned their backs to the Atlantic Alliance and the Christian world, thought and acted as if the island of Cyprus was their private property, their homeland, an integral part of the Great Byzantine Kingdom, and kept saying “We are the owners of Cyprus”.
In order to cleanse the island of Cyprus from the Turkish Cypriots, relying on the Atlantic Alliance and the Christian world, they applied the genocide, same as the armed attacks in Gaza of today, to us, the Turkish Cypriots during years 1963 to 1974.
When the Atlantic Alliance and the Christian world, which claim to be the flag bearers of “Human Rights, Peace and Justice”, did not raise voices such as “What are you doing, stop the massacres and genocide, you are violating human rights”, the brutal genocide they inflicted on us continued for 11 years till 1974.
They thought that they had the right to take away all the materialistic and spiritual life opportunities of the Turkish Cypriots by the armed attacks, to crush the Turkish Cypriots, to destroy them, to squeeze them into a tiny area like three percent of the island and only allow them to breathe, and they thought they were successful with the full scale support of the Atlantic Alliance and the Christian world.
In the second stage of the so-called negotiations that started in 1968, they would get up from the negotiation table whenever they felt like it, they would immediately reject the peaceful proposals made to them, they would try to corner the Turkish Cypriots by making proposals that would never happen and could not be accepted, they would put them in a difficult position and try to put them in a guilty position. Although it was agreed at the last stage of these negotiations to grant partial autonomy to the Turkish Cypriots, the Greek Cypriot leader of the period, Makarios, said, “I will not give the Turkish Cypriots even a neighbourhood headman ship, let alone an autonomy”, revealing that the negotiations were made for show and ended them.
Such was the mindset of the Greeks, such was the idea that they owned the island of Cyprus.
In July 1974, when the Colonels’ Junta in Greece staged a coup d’état on the island, overthrew the 1960 Republic of Cyprus, declared the “Hellenic Republic of Cyprus”, annexed the island to Greece and declared it as part of the Greece, the situation suddenly changed. Turkey, as a guarantor, had to intervene in order to re-establish the abolished 1960 Republic of Cyprus in the manner and method clearly stated in Annex 1, Article 4 of the 1960 Constitution of the Republic of Cyprus. In this way, the Turkish Cypriots were freed from captivity and were able to establish their own sovereign state in the northern parts of the island.
The negotiations, which started in 1977 to stop the armed conflicts on the island of Cyprus and to restore the 1960 Republic of Cyprus, ended in 2017 in Crans Montana, where the last stage of the negotiations was held, with the Greek Cypriots leaving the table due to their megalomanic and maximalist demands and behaviours.
The power and effectiveness of the Atlantic Alliance, which has been going on in the world since 1945, has started to decrease. The political and economic support of the Russian Federation and its allies, which unconditionally supported the Greeks and Greek Cypriots within the Christian world, came to an end. In the process, the mountains on which the Greek Cypriots had leaned and cocked their backs collapsed.
Once upon a time they were saying “We are the owners of the island of Cyprus. Whatever we say, whatever we want, only happens”. By the time the political situation dramatically changed. The Greek Cypriots and Greeks are now begging and pleading for the Turkish Cypriots to sit at the negotiation table. They are trying to get the support of the strong partners of the Atlantic Alliance such as the UN, the US and the EU to intervene, but no positive results.
It is time for them to pay for “obstructing the two peoples on the island from living in PEACE”, which they are the cause of the failure of the Annan Plan by voting “NO – OXI” in the Annan Plan referendum held on April 24, 2004, relying on the Atlantic Alliance and the Christian world…
Prof. Dr. (Civ Eng), Assoc. Prof. Dr. (Int Rel) Ata ATUN
Advisory Board Member of the TRNC President
TRNC Republican Assembly 1st Term Deputy