Cypriots have “no other choice” but to attempt to overturn the divided island’s status quo, President Nikos Christodoulides said on Friday. Speaking at the opening of a photographic exhibition created to mark 50 years since Turkey’s invasion of the island, he said the current state of affairs “cannot be the future of our homeland”, despite what he described as “the challenges, difficulties, and problems we face”.
“We are therefore working in this direction with actions and not with words in order to create the prospects for the resumption of substantial negotiations with the aim of finding a solution to the Cyprus problem,” he said. He reiterated his position that such a solution must be found on the basis of a bizonal, bicommunal federation, “and with European principles and values as its foundation”.
For this reason, he said, the government is “encouraging” the efforts of United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and his recently departed envoy on the island Maria Angela Holguin. On the matter of Holguin, he said June will be a “crucial month”, with Holguin’s report on her contacts on the island set to be written and submitted.
“We are hoping for positive developments,” he said, adding that the government is being informed about developments, “especially by countries which show a special interest” in the Cyprus problem.
Reflections on History
Speaking about the photographs on display, he said they “record in the most graphic way the pain on the faces of tens, hundreds, thousands of people, our compatriots.”
“These people are not strangers. They are our parents, our grandparents, our relatives, our neighbours. They are all those who had the unparalleled fortitude, will, and faith to rise from the ruins of that disaster and walk again,” he said. He added that those displaced had “rebuilt their lives from scratch thanks to their hard work and patriotism”.
“Although half a century has passed, the pain is profound and the agony indescribable every time one’s memory turns to the events of 1974, the Turkish invasion, the destruction … which is an unshakeable point of reference for every citizen of this place,” he said. He added that this is the case “no matter how much some try to downplay it”, describing the events of 1974 as an “unspeakable tragedy”.
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