Turkey must answer for its crimes, says Cyprus President

Turkey must answer for its crimes, says Cyprus President

FAMAGUSTA GAZETTE

• Wed, Jun 29, 2011

Turkey must answer for the crimes it has committed and continues to commit by occupying and violently dividing the island and the people of Cyprus, said here Tuesday President Christofias.

The statement was made during the President�s eulogy at the funeral of the remains of missing person Christodoulos Kouris, delivered on his behalf by Minister of Communications and Works Erato Kozakou Markoullis.

The Cyprus problem, President Christofias said, has many aspects resulting from the occupation and invasion of Turkey which continue – 37 years on – to afflict the people of Cyprus everyday.

Although it would be unfair to prioritize the tragic resonance of these aspects, nevertheless the missing persons issue and particularly the unbearable pain and suffering their relatives continue to endure 37 years on due to uncertainty and questions left unanswered is in fact the most tragic aspect of the Cypriot tragedy, the President pointed out.

President Christofias assured that the government has and continues to do its utmost in order to find what happened to all missing persons.

He noted that for years the resolution of this humanitarian problem has remained on a standstill because Turkey, which is responsible for the disappearances, had followed and continues to follow a policy of obstruction over the issue thus perpetuating the tragedy.

The Cyprus President said that since 2005 when the Committee on Missing Persons started an exhumations and identification of remains programme under the auspices of the UN and since the beginning of 2008 when intensive and independent exhumations by bi-communal groups of scientists started to be conducted, 184 Greek Cypriots and 58 Turkish Cypriots have been identified.

He continued to say that although the relatives are somewhat solaced when they are at last able to bury the remains of their loved ones, their suffering will not truly be over until answers are given to the countless questions haunting them relating to the disappearance of their loved ones.

Only Turkey possesses these answers, he pointed out, as they are documented in the archives of the Turkish army.

President Christofias further underlined that Turkey cannot refuse to take responsibility for the crimes it has committed against a people as a whole, something for which it has been convicted by the European Court of Human Rights.

Turkey, he noted, cannot continue to �knock on the door� of the EU whilst its hands are still stained by the blood of thousands of innocent victims of the Cypriot tragedy, including that of Christodoulos Kouris.

�Turkey must answer for the crimes it has committed and continues to commit by occupying and violently dividing the island and the people of Cyprus�, he stressed.

He added that �it must also answer for the crimes it continues to commit against the Turkish Cypriots themselves who have been reduced to a small and nearly extinct community due to the mass and continual influx of Turkish settlers in the areas it occupies.�

Christodoulos Kouri was born and lived in the now occupied village of Mia Milia. When the 2nd phase of the Turkish invasion took place in August 1974 he refused to abandon his village. He was listed as missing ever since. His remains were found in 2007 and were later identified.

Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkey invaded and occupied its northern third. As a result of the invasion, 1619 Greek-Cypriots were listed as missing, most of whom soldiers or reservists, who were captured in the battlefield.

Among them, however, were many civilians, women and children, arrested by the Turkish invasion troops and Turkish-Cypriot paramilitary groups, within the area controlled by the Turkish army after the end of hostilities and far away from the battlefield. Many of those missing were last seen alive in the hands of the Turkish military. A further 41 cases of Greek Cypriot missing persons have been recently added to the list of missing persons. These cases concern the period between 1963-1964, when inter-communal fighting broke out but none of them has been identified yet.

The number of Turkish Cypriot missing since 1974 and 1963/64 stands at 503.

In his latest report on the UN peace-keeping force in Cyprus, the UN Secretary General reported that ”complete access to military areas in the north for the purposes of exhumations remains crucial. I urge the Turkish Forces to adopt a more forthcoming approach, given the humanitarian dimension of the issue”.

via Turkey must answer for its crimes, says Cyprus President.