UK

"... had he [Annan] been more closely involved in the details, [he] would not have wished his name to be historically associated with such departures from international law and human rights standards.
Claire Palley, Constitutional Law adviser to Cypriot governments since 1980, in 'An International Relations Debacle', 2005

"...a significant opportunity to reach an agreed settlement was lost as a result of the conduct of the UN Secretariat, advised by the USA and the UK.''
Claire Palley, in 'An International Relations Debacle', 2005

"The Secretariat sought to mislead the international community through the Secretary-General's Reports and briefings it prepared, so as to pressure a small state effectively to accept the consequences of aggression by a large neighbouring state allied to two permanent members of the Security Council.''
Claire Palley, in 'An International Relations Debacle', 2005

"If the Greek-Cypriots say 'no' to the Annan plan, we will take them to a new referendum, until they say 'yes'.
Lord Hanney, architect of the Annan plan

"Nothing fundamental has changed in the past 28 years: Turkey has maintained the military advantage, in the form of a 30,000 strong garrison on the island, whereas the Greek Cypriot side has retained the diplomatic high ground, including a monopoly of international recognition and a raft of UN resolutions calling on the Turks to withdraw their troops and make way for the islands reunification."
The Economist, 12–19 October 2002

"…Turkey’s crypto-fascist regime.”
John Pilger, The New Rulers of the World, 2002

"All concessions on the Cyprus issue have so far come from the Greek Cypriots. Denktash is now asking for legalisation of the spoils of war. We ask you to remember."
Eddie O’Hara MP at Cyprus meeting at the House of Lords, 15 January 2001

"The behaviour of the Turkish infantry featured gratuitous violence against Greek Cypriot civilians unlucky enough to lie in their path; word of the rapes, murders and looting which marked their advance was enough to convince Greek Cypriots to flee for their safety from the occupied areas…"
Marc Dubin, ‘Cyprus, The Rough Guide’

"Using covert channels, and short-circuiting the democratic process in his own country, he [Kissinger] made himself an accomplice in a plan of political assassination which, when it went awry, led to the deaths of thousands of civilians, the violent uprooting of almost 200,000 refugees, and the creation of an unjust and unstable amputation of Cyprus which constitutes a serious threat to peace a full quarter-century later. On July 10 1976, the European Commission on Human Rights adopted a report, prepared by 18 distinguished jurists and chaired by Professor JES Fawcett, resulting from a year's research into the consequences of the Turkish invasion. It found that the Turkish army had engaged in the deliberate killing of civilians, in the execution of prisoners, in the torture and ill-treatment of detainees, in the arbitrary punishment and detention of civilians, and in systematic acts of rape, torture, and looting. A large number of “disappeared” persons, both prisoners of war and civilians, are still “missing” from this period. They include a dozen holders of US passports, which is evidence in itself of an indiscriminate strategy, when conducted by an army dependent on US aid and matériel."
Christopher Hitchens, The Trial of Henry Kissinger (Verso), 2001

"In December [1999], the Education Ministry in Turkey asked a math publisher not to use the letters "p" and "k" in algebraic equations because they could form the acronym for the rebel Kurdistan Workers Party (The PKK). The Ministry suggested using the letters e, f, g and h instead."
The Guardian, Saturday April 1 2000

"…a people who have been degraded, humiliated and treated as an inferior race for decades... The appalling repression of the Kurdish people in Turkey is generally unreported in the British media and virtually ignored at Government level... Turkey is a military, totalitarian regime masquerading as a democracy."
Howard Pinter, The Guardian, 20 February 1999

"The evidence suggests the majority of Turkish Kurds want only equal treatment..."
Leader, The Guardian, 17 February 1999

"His [Ocalan's] fate does not bear imagining in a Turkish jail. All the evidence suggests that torture in Turkey is not lessening under international pressure. They are simply getting better at hiding the signs."
Turkish Delight – They only hit me with a gun. But they hammered a nail into Abdullah's head', The Guardian, 1 December 1998

"The [Turkish] army had destroyed villages and brought about large-scale forced evacuations... Throughout the Kosovo crisis the Serbs charged the West with a double standard. Turkey's treatment of the Kurds was far worse than anything the West accused the Serbs of doing in Kosovo, they said, yet as Turkey was a member of NATO the West turned a blind eye. The Serbs were right... Western governments should put as much pressure on Turkey to change its policies as it has on Yugoslavia."
Leader article, The Guardian, November 25 1998

"In the summer of 1983 a Turkish embassy spokesman in Washington told the Washington Post that Turkey supported the Indonesian position on East Timor at the United Nations because it saw a 'parallel' with the Turkish case in Cyprus. The spokesman was being a little ungenerous to his own government. All verifiable and independent reports show the government of Indonesia to have been guilty of near-genocide in East Timor, using the weapon of starvation, and indulging in the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians. One wonders at any government which would voluntarily associate itself with such an atrocity."
Christopher Hitchens, 'Cyprus: Hostage to History', May 1997

"We are all prisoners of knowledge. To know how Cyprus was betrayed, and to have studied the record of that betrayal, is to make oneself unhappy and to spoil, perhaps for ever, one's pleasure for visiting one of the word's most enchanting islands. Nothing will ever restore the looted treasures, the bereaved families, the plundered villages and the groves and hillsides scalded with napalm. Nor will anything mitigate the record of the callous and crude politicians who regarded Cyprus as something on which to scribble their inane and conceited designs. But fatalism would be the worst betrayal of all. The acceptance, the legitimization of what was done - those things must be repudiated. Such a refusal has a value beyond Cyprus in showing that acquiescence in injustice is not 'realism'. Once the injustice has been set down and described, and called by its right name, acquiescence in it becomes impossible. That is why one writes about Cyprus in sorrow but more - much more - in anger."
Christopher Hitchens, 'Cyprus: Hostage to History', May 1997

"In 1954 I felt great anxiety about Cyprus...
Harold Macmillan was urging us to stir up the Turks in order to neutralise the Greek agitation. I wrote a minute in opposition to this tactic. I also asked the Prime Minister's private secretary if I could see Churchill on the subject, but he absolutely refused even to pass on the suggestion, which he clearly regarded as impertinence."
CM Woodhouse in his autobiography 'Something Ventured', 1982

"...we came across a desecrated church in the centre of a busy village between Famagusta and Nicosia. Fresh excrement and urine lay on the smashed altar and the floor. The church Bible had been used as toilet paper and the wall paintings had been gashed and disfigured. The icons had vanished. From the state of the place it was clear that this was not a single act of violation. The place obviously had been a public convenience for months."
John Torode, 'Cyprus treasures at risk', letter to the editor, The Times, 19 August 1980

"… the demographic Turkification of the north will soon be complete. Towns and villages such as Kyrenia and Lapithos which stood empty and ghostly until April are now filled with settlers, some Turkish Cypriot, some mainland Turks. The return of the original inhabitants is ruled out, and the Turkish authorities now say quite openly that the remaining 5,800 Greek Cypriots in the north (of a total of 14,500 two years ago) will be reduced by half this Christmas."
The Economist, 4 September 1976

“Bellapais has been dying by degrees since the beginning of the year when the Turks began moving out in small groups the 700 inhabitants… There are now fewer than 20 people left in the village and they will all be gone by the weekend.”
John Bierman, The Guardian, 5 July 1976

‘Immediately after the invasion of July we sought to secure a cease-fire… I continued with our diplomatic efforts, but with every hour that passed our team became more gloomy. There were flashes of common sense. Acting President Glafkos Clerides and Rauf Denktash, the leader of the Turkish Committee, both brought intelligence and genuine concern to the discussion on the future of their country. If it had been left to them it is conceivable that they might have hammered out an agreement. But Denktash was not a free agent, and confessed to me that in the last resort he was obliged to obey his masters in Turkey.’
James Callaghan (after the Turkish invasion of July 1974), 'Time and Change', Collins/Fontana, Glasgow, 1987, pp.353–54

"Many Turkish Cypriots say they regret the exous of the Greeks and even that they feel more affinity with these fellow Cypriots than they do with the mainland Turks..."
The Spectator, 1978

"Confidential United Nations military documents, circulated to officers in the United Nations peace-keeping force in Cyprus, disclose that looting is being systematically carried out on a massive scale by the Turkish and Turkish Cypriot authorities in the north of the island."
The Times, 13 December 1976

"Then we had a visit from two Turkish Cypriots on November 8. They were originally from Kokkina (a Turkish Cypriot village still under the control of the Greek Cypriot government) and they said we had 15 days to leave. They said they had been told that they could have our house and that the authorities had sent them round to us.
I did not believe this was true and said: "You cannot tell us to leave. What authority have you got?" So the taller man held up a piece of paper with a Turkish stamp on it, which gave his name as Haum Mehmet and listed our house as 'F55'. In Yaloussa, the village was so small that we never had street numbers but this was the Turkish designation of our home. I told the men to leave and they did.
But next day a Turkish girl who lived two houses away and who was a friend of mine came to our home. She said that the Turks were going to burn my husband's lorry unless we aggreed to leave immediately.
On the same day, Mr. Mehmet came back. He said he could bring some boxes for us if we needed extra packing cases when we moved. Then he asked my husband to show him how the water-heater worked in our bathroom."
Robert Fisk, 'Further expulsions belie Turkish claims of a voluntary exodus', The Times, 9 December 1976

"Bellapais, the Greek Cyroot village made famous by Laurence Durrell's 'Bitter Lemons', is no longer Greek: two weeks ago its last seven Greek inhabitants gave up the struggle against the Turkish squeeze. With their departure the number of Greek Cypriots in the entire Kyrenia district of northern Cyprus is now fewer that 30. Because of this, the Turkish authorities say that the United Nations force in Cyprus no longer needs a post in that area".
'Cyprus – a bitter lemon squeezed dry', The Economist, 4 September 1976

"The demographic Turkification of the north will soon be complete. Towns and villages such as Kyrenia and Lapithos which stood empty and ghostly until April are now filled with settlers, some Turkish Cypriot, some mainland Turks. The return of the original inhabitants is ruled out, and the Turkish authorities now say quite openly that the remaining 5,800 Greek Cypriots in the north (of a total of 14,500 two years ago) will be reduced by half this Christmas".
The Economist, 4 September 1976

"The old countryman's eyes were heavy with tears he had not yet shed. What did he think would happen to Bellapais when the last of its people had left? His previously firm voice broke at the thought and the tears began to flow. 'Erimia', he said, 'Desolation'.
Bellapais has been dying by degrees since the beginning of the year when the Turks began moving out in small groups the 700 inhabitants of this hauntingly beautiful village, made world famous by Lawrence Durrell's 1955 bestseller, Bitter Lemons.
There are now fewer than 20 people left in the village and they will all be gone by the weekend".
John Bierman, The Guardian, 5 July 1976

""The little treasure house of Anphonitis Monastery, in the mountains north of Lefkoniko, had sustained the most comprehensive looting and damage.
Our guide book, pointing out that the key to the monastery was held at the nearest police station five miles down the mountain, eulogized the the eleventh, twelfth and fifteenth centry icons and the sixteenth century frescoes. All had vanised or had been destroyed. The nineteenth and twentieth century icons were smashed, the furniture broken. In the corner were bags of cement and the remains of a fire.
Furniture had been lugged outside onto the grass, and the whole place was strewn with bottles and filth. Somebody was clearly proud of this work, for on the wrecked iconostasis the date was chalked March , 1975.
...Now that Northern Cyprus has declared itself a separate state, federated with Turkey and headed by Mr. Rauf Denktash... the process of obliterating everything Greek has been carried out methodically. The churches and graveyards have suffered severely."
The Times, 27 May 1976

"We visited 26 former Greek villages [in occupied north of Cyprus]. We found not a single undesecrated cemetery... At Syngrasis, the church interior was smashed beyond recognition, littered with the remains of icons, pews and beer bottles. The broken crucifix was drenched in urine.""
The Guardian, 6 May 1976

"Identical reports appear throughout the documents which also refer to acts of violence against Greek Cypriots. On October 9 this year, summary 4040, again dealt with Sector Six and stated: 'During night time 3/10 to 4/10/76 five Tk Cyp (Turkish Cypriot) men entered the house of Gk Cyp Lysandros Foka in the village of Ayias Trias, beat him up, robbed money in the value of 581 Cyprus pounds (&830) and raped his 14-year old daughter. Another Tk Cyp was guarding outside while the five Turks committed the crimes. The Tk Cyps were carrying a shotgun and fired at least one shot in the air."
The Times, 13 February 1976

"We were told in Bellapais to be ready to move at 24 hours notice, and for many months people were ready for a forced expulsion", said Dr Frazer, a Scottish doctor of 74 who we came across two weeks ago. "Imagine the strain of living like that with everything paked, herds disposeed of at ruthlessly low prices, other livestock killed and eaten".. The forced expulsion never happened. People now sign to say that they come voluntarily. If they don't sign they know they will have to come and that the Turks will allow them to bring nothing. So they give up their homes, leave behind their land and their fathers' land, their trees and lemon groves and trek south while the Turkish colonizers take over their homes."
Voice of the Unions, October 1976

"It is important that we should avoid any suggestion that in favouring the geographical separation of the two communities as the most viable solution of the Cyprus problem, we are working for the partition of the island. We should use the term ‘bi-regional federation’."
Foreign Office memorandum, 16 August 1974

"...while the peace talks went on, Turkish soldiers were killing and terrorising innocent civilians... As they are in Cyprus in the name of Turkey, that nation must immediately take action against the animals that wear its uniform."
The Sun, 5 August 1974

"The early stages of the Cyprus conflict, in the mid-1950s, were mainly a struggle between the Greek Cypriots and the British Colonial power, with the Turks at that time hardly interested in the island. There is strong evidence that the British government of the day deliberately encouraged an indifferent Turkey to take a more active interest, as a useful counterweight in the struggle against the Greeks, One of the most violent expressions of this artificially contrived Turkish indignation was on the night of 6th-7th September 1955, when a terrifying Turkish mob destroyed quantities of Greek property in Istanbul. It should be noted that at the Yassiada trials 1960 evidence was given by defence witnesses that the Turkish government had been put up to staging a Cyprus demonstration by the then British Foreign Secretary Harold Macmillan, but that the demonstration, mismanaged by Menderes, had degenerated into an uncontrollable riot."
David Hotham, 'The Turks', 1972

"The welfare, and indeed the lives of our people, depends on Cyprus as a protective guard and staging post to take care of those interests, above all oil. This is not imperialism. It should be the plain duty of any government and we intend to discharge it."
British Prime Minister Sir Anthony Eden, 1960, regarding Britain's invitation of Turkey to a tripartite conference on the future of Cyprus in 1955 to counter Greek Cypriots claims for enosis

"I could not help reflecting wryly that had we been honest enough to admit the Greek nature of Cyprus in the beginning, it might never have been necessary to abandon the island or fight for it. Now, it was too late!"
Lawrence Durrell, Director of Public Relations for the British colonial government in Cyprus, 1957, in his book 'Bitter Lemons of Cyprus'

"Was Cyprus ever Greek? To cast doubt on the desire of Cypriots for union with Greece British Tory papers pretend that Cyprus was never part of Greece… the islanders have been predominantly Greek-speaking for over 2,500 years. Cyprus was Greek before England was English.

For centuries Cyprus was part of the Greek-speaking Alexandrian and Byzantine Empires – that is to say it was under Greek rule.

It was conquered by the Turks in 1570 but the islanders rose against the Turks in 1764, 1804 and 1821, when many islanders were massacred by the Turkish rulers. Despite all tribulations the islanders have remained Greek in speech and culture."
The Educational Commentary on Current Affairs, Issued by the Daily Worker in association with the Marx Memorial Library, 26 September 1955

"The lowest estimate of lives lost given by the refugees, places the total at one hundred and twenty thousand."
London Daily Chronicle, 18 September 1922, regarding the slaughter of the Greek and Armenian inhabitants of Smyrna

"…the Ottomanisation of all Turkish citizens, which never succeeded through persuasion, had to be done by the force of arms."
The Times, 3 October 1911

"I think it is only natural that the Cypriot people, who are of Greek descent, should regard their incorporation with what may be called their mother-country as an ideal to be earnestly, devoutly, and fervently cherished. Such a feeling is an example of the patriotic devotion which so nobly characterises the Greek nation."
Winston Churchill, 17 October 1907

"Wherever they [the Turks] went a broad line of blood marked the track behind them, and, as far as their dominion reached, civilization disappeared from view. They represented everywhere government by force as opposed to government by law."
William Gladstone

"The barbarian power, which has been for centuries seated in the very heart of the Old World, which has in its brute clutch the most famous countries of classical and religious antiquity and many of the most fruitful and beautiful regions of the earth; and, which, having no history itself, is heir to the historical names of Constantinople and Nicaea, Nicomedia and Caesarea, Jerusalem and Damascus, Nineva and Babylon, Mecca and Bagdad, Antioch and Alexandria, ignorantly holding in its possession one half of the history of the whole world."
Cardinal Newman (1801-1890)

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