Uzay Bulut, Sunday August 3, 2014 | What about Turkey and Cyprus? Part 2For part 1, see "For What about Turkey and Cyprus?"
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in his presidential election rally in the southern province of Mersin that Israel will be tried by an international court if it continues to act with its current mentality. "We will see that. As Turkey, we will struggle for that," he added.
Ironically, when the European Court of Human Rights convicted Turkey in May of this year for its crimes during the 1974 invasion of Cyprus, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said that Turkey would ignore the ECHR ruling to pay compensation to the Republic of Cyprus.
"This ruling is neither binding within international law nor does it have any value for us," Davutoglu said.
Davutoglu made these statements at the end of a meeting of the U.N. Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People.
So, after passionately defending the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, Davutoglu announced that Turkey would refuse to pay Cyprus the compensation ruled by the ECHR in respect of the non-pecuniary damage suffered by the relatives of the missing persons, and by the enclaved Greek-Cypriot residents of the Karpas peninsula during the Turkish invasion of Cyprus.
If Turkish state officials do not recognize the rulings of international courts, then why do they threaten Israel with being tried in the same courts?
In 2011, Erdogan said that Hamas is not a terrorist organization but a movement of resistance that tries to protect its country from occupation. When Erdogan said that, the Gaza Strip was not occupied; there was not a single Israeli in Gaza as Israel had withdrawn all its citizens and soldiers from there in 2005.
Erdogan, who has a great deal of sympathy for Hamas, does not seem to have the least of it for the Republic of Cyprus.
Last year, he even said at a meeting at Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest that "there is not a country called Cyprus."
He added: "There is the Southern Greek Cypriot Administration. There is a Green Line, and then at the northern part of it is the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. The new name of this region according to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation is the Turkish State of Cyprus. The Kofi Annan plan also names it like that."
Unfortunately, no one in the conference rectified Erdogan's incorrect statements.
Of course there is a country called the Republic of Cyprus. This is recognized by the whole world, although the northern part of it has been occupied by Turkey for 40 years. And there is also the "Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus," which is recognized only by Turkey. The international community correctly calls it the Turkish-occupied territory of the Republic of Cyprus.
But how did the occupied northern part of Cyprus fall into the hands of Turkey?
Even though Turkish state officials proudly acclaim their 1974 "victory" in Cyprus, and try to insult the Republic of Cyprus by claiming that it does not exist, the 1974 invasion of the island was a collective crime against humanity and never a victory for people of conscience.
The "victory" for Turkey was a deprivation of life for Cypriots, including indiscriminate killings of civilians, the bombing of civilian targets and hospitals, and cold-blooded murders that included women, old men, and children as young as 6 months old.
Turkish army officials who took part in the invasion not only killed Cypriot civilians but stole their property, as well.
Land, houses, businesses and industries belonging to Greek Cypriots were seized and distributed by the Turkish occupation forces to persons other than their legal owners.
They subjected persons of both sexes and all ages to torture and degrading treatment, including wholesale and repeated rapes.
They arbitrarily detained thousands of Greek Cypriot civilians in the occupied area under inhuman conditions. They subjected them to forced labor and established concentration camps.
A total of 1,619 persons have been missing since the 1974 Turkish invasion of Cyprus and as a direct consequence of it.
Turkey, which forcibly displaced approximately 170,000 Greek Cypriots from their homes in the occupied area and refused to allow them to return, is blaming Israel for being an "occupier" in an attempt to boost its own international prestige.
After committing all those crimes against humanity, Turkish state officials falsely declare that there is no country called Cyprus.
Ever since the occupation began, Turkey has maintained that it carried out a "peace operation" to restore the constitutional order of Cyprus following a brief Greek Cypriot coup and to protect Turkish Cypriots from harm and danger.
Turkey experienced two coups d'etat, in 1960 and 1971, before invading Cyprus.
Then, six years after the invasion of Cyprus, in 1980, came the most horrific Turkish coup d'etat, claiming thousands of lives. How can Turkey, which has not been able to draft a civil constitution for itself for 34 years after this coup, claim the ability to restore another country's constitutional order?
The human rights record of Turkey during and after the occupation shows clearly that the brief Greek coup d'etat was just a pretext for Turkey to invade Cyprus.
You don't torture, rape or forcibly displace innocent civilians after seizing their property if your only aim is to restore constitutional order and to protect people there.
Sadly, the international community buys into this Turkish state propaganda. And even globally known intellectuals such as Noam Chomsky seem to fall into its trap.
"Turkey is the only country that has explicitly displayed its stern attitude toward Israel and has opposed Israel's oppression of Palestine," Chomsky told the state-run Anadolu news agency. But while praising Turkey's attitude toward Israel, he uttered not a word about the Turkish occupation of Cyprus.
Every time the international community sees Turkish state officials bashing Israel for its military operation in Gaza, it should recall the ongoing Turkish occupation of Cyprus.
Wars must come to an end; killings of innocent people must come to an end. So must hypocrisy and double standards.
While the officials of a colonizing country are occupying the land of Cypriots, can they be sincerely concerned about the suffering in Gaza? If they can, it only shows their hypocrisy and anti-Semitism.
Uzay Bulut is a freelance journalist based in Ankara.
Link to source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=9431
