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Turkish Cypriot
""Cypriot Turks carried out a revolution?", says Mehmet Ali Talat. Professor from Turkey Eser Karakas says exactly the opposite. He says, Cypriot Turks were spent as pawns... But, we continued to be daydreamers. We continue to be so even when we are told in our face that we are a pawn. At present, we are proud of ourselves as revolutionaries for having successfully planned with our occupiers the process of putting ourselves in an icebox as valuable hostages."
Sener Levent in Afrika (Turkish Cypriot newspaper), 25 October 2004
"I feel very bad because the owner of the house is here and she is crying." Her husband, Adnan, said: "This house is not our house. This house is your house.""
Turkish Cypriots quoted in ‘I'm happy to be home, so sad I can't stay’ by Colin Brown in the Telegraph, 27 April 2003. The article follows a Greek Cypriot family visiting their occupied village of Ayios Amvrosios and meeting the Turkish Cypriots currently residing in their property.
"We got what we wanted!"
Headline in Turkish Cypriot newspaper Yeniduzen regarding the result of the referenda on the proposed Annan Plan
"We are exceedingly pleased with the press reaction to the UN Secretary General's latest draft plan for a solution. My joy stems as much from Annan's pro-Turkish stance as it does from the nature of the Greek Cypriot outcry. We never saw such a Greek Cypriot uproar during any of the previous negotiations. My view is that it is because, for the first time, we have a draft solution supporting Turkish interests to such an extent."
Hasan Ercakica in Turkish Cypriot newspaper Yeniduzen on the proposed Annan Plan
"Our [Turkish Cypriot] people should know that launching a yes campaign and eulogizing the unseen fourth plan is nothing but defeatism, and as such should not be taken in by the propaganda of lies."
Sabahattin Ismail in Turkish Cypriot newspaper Afrika on the proposed Annan Plan
"It is not possible for Ankara and Denktash to continue their old despotism. Even if they do not recognize and exclude the Republic of Cyprus, they cannot do the same with the EU. With Cyprus’ accession to the EU international law will lay its hand here, for the first time after 1974. Shortly you too are going to feel this. Those who oppress you now when you are citizens of the Republic of Cyprus, will not be able to do the same when you are citizens of the EU".
‘International law is coming’, article in Turkish Cypriot newspaper Afrika, 17 March 2003
"We live in a dictatorship, run by the Turkish military and their cohort, Denktash… You can live a normal life here if you keep quiet, if you don’t tell the truth that we live under Turkish occupation, that much of our territory is a military zone where we can't go … I want a unified Cyprus that can join the European Union, not for economic reasons, but to have a democracy, to have European laws with respect for human rights. We don't want to live under Turkish law.”
Sener Levent, Turkish Cypriot, editor/publisher of Afrika
“For years we have been living under the command of others: Turkish military permeates our lives at every level… Hundreds of charges have been brought against us, most of them related to our habit of presenting the Turkish presence in Cyprus as an occupation…”
“What wouldn’t we give now to see our homeland reunited! Those who imposed this division on us are still trying to keep us permanently apart.”
“Certainly it was not easy for me to shout that my country is under occupation… They made me realise that I am a Cypriot.”
Sener Levent, Turkish Cypriot editor/publisher of Afrika, 2002
"Why have Turkish Cypriots been left to the mercy of the Turkish military?"
"We are Turkish Cypriots and our interests are not with Turkey. We are looking for our interests as Cypriots."
Points put to Britain’s Envoy to Cyprus Lord Hannay and Peter Hain, Minister for Europe, by Turkish Cypriots at Cyprus meeting at the House of Lords, 15 January 2001
"...you are condemned to be crushed by a 65-million-strong Turkey."
Warning to Greek Cypriots by Turkish occupation representative Rauf Denktash soon after delivering what he termed a "peace plan" for permanent apartheid in Cyprus, 9 September 1998
"A sunny prison..."
Description of Turkish occupied area of Cyprus by Mehmet Ali Talat, Turkish Cypriot leader of Republican Turkish Party, 26 March 1997
"In the coming 20 years it will be difficult to pinpoint a single Turkish Cypriot. Denktash is justified in taking so much pride in his work."
Kutlu Adali, January 1996 (Turkish Cypriot political journalist who was assasinated in 1996 in occupied Cyprus)
"Cypriot women do not sit in front of their homes anymore. People from Anatolia, who wear colourful dresses, have taken their place. Some of them talk in Turkish, in an incomprehensible way. Others converse in Kurdish, Arabic and Persian. All that is an indication that we are gradually integrating into Anatolia."
Kutlu Adali, August 1994 (Turkish Cypriot political journalist who was assasinated in 1996 in occupied Cyprus)
"I remember that when I was a child, the population of Turkish Cypriots, which was only 65,000 was shown as 85,000 by the Turkish leadership. When our population was shown officially as 104,320 by the 1960 population census the Turkish Cypriot leadership presented it as 120,000. Our population in 1974 should have been 115,000 but was presented to be 140,000. When it was declared as 180,000 it has come to the surface that population from Turkey was transferred to the island."
Kutlu Adali, March 1993 (Turkish Cypriot political journalist who was assasinated in 1996 in occupied Cyprus)
"The bad politicians who have lost the Turkish Cypriots' trust went to the tens of thousands of colonists who arrived from Turkey to secure their votes. They [the politicians] told these people: for God's sake save us and we shall give you the properties left by the Greek Cypriots. And once Ankara opened its purse, the demographic structure of the island was destroyed in such a way that the Turkish Cypriots have become a minority."
Kutlu Adali, December 1992 (Turkish Cypriot political journalist who was assasinated in 1996 in occupied Cyprus)
"Turkish Cypriots... would like to coexist with their Greek Cypriot compatriots instead of being under Turkish military rule".
Turkish Cypriot in German newspaper 'Die Welt'
"The Turkish Cypriots are uneasy and concerned about the transfer of Turks to Cyprus...The fact that the Turkish Cypriots are becoming a minority ... does not bother Denktash. On the contrary he is pleased. It makes him happy because as the number of settlers increases, Denktash's percentage of the vote increases too."
Yenidüzen (Turkish Cypriot newspaper), 29 June 1987
"Denktash is able, in front of everybody without hesitation, to make untrue statements with ease… Denktash is trying to mislead both the Turkish Cypriots and the world."
Yenidüzen (Turkish Cypriot newspaper), 29 June 1987
"Naturally Turkey has strategic interests in Cyprus. It is fortunate that the Turkish Cypriot community exists here. Even if the Turkish Cypriot community did not exist, Turkey would not have left Cyprus to Greece."
Turkish occupation representative Rauf Denktash, 23 July 1985
"However we, for some time now, are trying to destroy with our hands our history, culture and, in the last analysis, ourselves. We have abandoned our historical masterpieces – with their Greek columns, Gothic ornaments, yellow-stoned arches and Seljukian domes – to destruction and pillage...
Cyprus is being estranged fro itself; the historic, environmental, communal, and cultrural structure is being spoiled. The vacant unattended archaeological masterpieces are being pillaged."
Mehmet Yasin, in 'Perishing Cyprus' in Turkish Cypriot newspaper Olay, 26 April - 17 May 1982
"When the armed struggle started, the British had at their disposal thousands of men and could even increase their existing numbers to put down the EOKA struggle. This they did not do, but they formed instead the well known Auxiliary Corps. The ordinary Turkish Cypriots, who did not realize where the British were leading them (since their leadership did not warn them, rather it encouraged them), hastened to reinforce this Auxiliary Corps thinking only of securing a living.
Thus, the Greek Cypriots, who thought that they were waging a holy struggle against the British, found themselves facing the Turkish Cypriots. In this way the British started submitting to the Turkish community their plans for partition."
Ibrahim Aziz, 'The Historical Course of the Turkish Cypriot Community', 1981
"This paradise is being turned into a hell."
Dr Fazil Kutchuk, 1978
"Although the nucleus of the first Turkish Cypriot political party was organised in 1942, it was not until 1955 that the Turkish Cypriot community became politically active. Within the next three years, a community political structure was developed as a result not only of efforts of Turkish Cypriot leaders to oppose enosis, but also of encouragement from British and Turkish officials who were seeking to safeguard their countries' strategic interests".
Dr Fazil Kutchuk in interview to RA Patrick, Doctoral Dissertation, London School of Economics and Political Science, 1972
"Cyprus is another Alexandretta in the history of Turkey. The power of Turkey will ensure an honorable life for the Turkish Cypriots in the same way as it did in Alexandretta by annexing it and bringing it under Turkish domination. The road in this direction has been opened by the Turkish fighters at Kokkina, who are now fighting in every corner of Cyprus"
Halkan Sesi, mouthpiece of Turkish Cypriot leadership, 9 August 1965
"The Turkish fighters have pledged to fight on until the realization of partition. The attitude of the Turkish minority has been admittedly one of provoking division and instigating armed conflict with the aim of partition."
Halkan Sesi, mouthpiece of Turkish Cypriot leadership, 29 February 1964
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