THE GREEK CHORUS ON STAGE AGAIN Greek Cypriot President Tassos Papadopoulos defined the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) “as the biggest enemy” faced by Greek Cyprus in his press conference on Wednesday, demanding the immediate removal of all the Turkish military forces from Cyprus.
The good old Greek chorus started chanting the same tune again.
Mr. Demetris Christofias, the secretary-general of the Greek Cy-priot Progressive Party of the Working People (AKEL), the largest leftist political party in Greek Cyprus and the “last of the world’s communist parties,” mentioned the same in his presidential rally speech.
Mrs. Erato Kozakou-Marcoulli, the Greek Cypriot foreign minister, directed her arrows of hate toward the Turkish military from her first day in the ministerial seat. She verbally attacked the TSK on the island and demanded their withdrawal along with some of the citizens of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (KKTC), who they indiscriminately call “settlers.”
Archbishop Chrysostomos II actually composed this tune during his own rally. Irrespective of his position, words full of hatred toward Turkish people were always present in his speeches. He publicly pin-pointed Turkish Cypriots and the TSK as the mother of the enemy more than 300 times.
The sentence “Europe is Christian” also belongs to him. “Of course Christianity is not simply European, but in any case Europe is Christian. Europe before Christianity was just a geographical term. Its inhabitants were distinguished as those who lived within the borders of the Roman Empire or the ecumene (lands inhabited by Greeks), and those who lived outside the borders and were generally called ‘barba-rians’,” he says.
Though quite conscientious about his words connected with Tur-key and the TSK, Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis speaks from time to time about the withdrawal of the TSK from Cyprus. Of course he never says anything about the Greek Army deployed in Greek Cyprus or the Greek officers positioned in the highest ranks of the Greek Cyprus National Guard (Ethniki Froura).
When speaking of topics related to Cyprus or Turkey, Mrs. Dora Bakoyannis, the Greek foreign minister, always puts the withdrawal of the TSK from Cyprus somewhere in her speech, regardless of whether it is in conjunction with the main topic. She also mentions the return of some of the citizens of the KKTC, who they class as unofficial immi-grants.
The Greek members of the European Parliament consistently send letters and notes to their colleagues focused on the withdrawal of Turkish troops from the island.
The ethnically Greek senators and members of the US House of Representatives are doing exactly the same thing as their European counterparts. Hand-in-hand with the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association (AHEPA), they call on the US government to support the immediate removal of all Turkish occupying forces as well as the illegal Turkish colonists from Cyprus.
It looks as if a magic wand touched these people and they all speak the same. Perhaps their words actually stem from the same ori-gin or mastermind. They never mention or want others to know what Greeks did to Turkish Cypriots during the dark 10 years stretching from 1963 to 1974.
The period covered the time from the establishment of the Repub-lic of Cyprus in 1960 to 1974. Greek Cypriots attempted to demolish the republic by changing the Constitution and enforced the Akritas plan on Dec. 21, 1963 — a plan of which Mr. Papadopoulos was one of the masterminds.
The international community, accusing Turkey of occupation, seems to be forgetting the fact that Greece secretly sent a division of 20,000 troops to the island in 1964. As a result Turkish Cypriots had to evacuate 103 villages and were squeezed into “ghettos” covering barely 3 percent of the total island. They were forced to survive with unemployment, economic sanctions, restricted rights of movement and no property rights and were even massacred until 1974.
From this point on things changed dramatically on the island. Turkey had to intervene to save the lives of Turkish Cypriots as the speed of the genocide have accelerated after the declaration of the “Cy-prus Hellenic Republic,” on July 16, 1974. It was notorious butcher Nicos Sampson, a right-wing Greek operative, who was installed by the Greek junta as president for the unilaterally declared new republic.
It is a fact that Turkish Cypriots had been struggling for ages to live in peace on the island, but were instead forced by their adversaries to rely on the armed forces and attach to their motherland, Turkey.
The existence of the Turkish military on the island fully complies with the international rules and regulations and Part IV of the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee of the Constitution of Republic of Cyprus.
It is a crystal-clear fact that the existence of the Turkish military on the island has prevented inter-communal clashes since 1974. Ir-respective of thousands of Cypriots losing their lives during the dark years of 1963 to 1974, nobody lost a life afterward.
