Turkish Cypriots

NICOSIA – Cyprus will grant its first license for a casino resort within about a year, the government said on Friday, to be built in the south of the island where gambling has been strictly prohibited. Scores of Greek Cypriots regularly cross into the north of Cyprus, a breakaway Turkish Cypriot state recognized only by Ankara and where there are several casinos.

Prime Minister Antonis Samaras has vowed to stand by the Cypriot government in its reunification talks with Turkish-Cypriots after meeting President Nicos Anastasiades in Athens on Monday.

“Greece and Cyprus will continue until the end our peaceful common struggle to overturn the fait accompli of the Turkish occupation,” Samaras said after the talks at the Maximos Mansion.

Turkish popstar Bengü has been denied entry into a Greek island for having a Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus visa on her passport, the daily Hürriyet reported on its website.

Bengü, 35, was on holiday in Çeşme, a popular location in İzmir, before going to the island of Chios, on the other side of the Aegean Sea.

Amid the burning problems of Iraq, Syria, Gaza, Ukraine, and others, surrounding Turkey, not many people noticed that this year marked the 40th anniversary of the Cyprus Peace Operation of July 20, 1974. Once described as the “national issue” in Turkey, it no longer occupies the center stage in public discussions.

Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades is due in Athens on Monday to discuss the ongoing reunification talks on the island with Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras and Foreign Minister Evangelos Venizelos.

Turkish President Abdullah Gül has urged for a solution to be found on the divided island of Cyprus, speaking at a ceremony in Nicosia to mark the 40th anniversary of Turkey’s military intervention on July 20, 1974.

It was not only Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan but the entire Turkey condemned Israeli attacks against Palestinians, Turkish President Abdullah Gül has said.

Cyprus’s Greek and Turkish communities must work together to make sure that partition does not become a permanent fixture, President Nicos Anastasiades said yesterday as talks to reunite the Mediterranean island appear to have stalled.

Forty years after the division of Cyprus, Greek and Turkish Cypriot schoolchildren are still being taught separate narratives of their shared legacy of pain.

On July 20, 1974, the first Turkish troops landed on the north coast at Kyrenia, with the declared aim of protecting the Turkish Cypriot minority after a coup to unite the island with Greece.

A group of Greek Cypriots has filed a war crimes complaint against Turkey at the International Criminal Court over what they say is its policy of settling Cyprus’ breakaway north with mainland Turks.