Cyprus President Demetris Christofias said the country has suffered in the past from a nationalist rhetoric, which has brought about disaster and an unresolved Cyprus issue for the past 38 years.

Addressing a memorial service, in a village in the southwestern District of Paphos, the President of the Republic said a permanent division of Cyprus would constitute a victory for the advocates of chauvinism and nationalism.

“Those who embraced nationalism and chauvinism have been dragging this place to the path of violence, blood and madness and have finally managed to bring about disaster” the President underlined.

These people, he went on, managed to bring this place to the state it is today, a divided country with a problem that remains unsolved for 38 years now.

The President added that people must employ their unfailing intuition and fight against nationalism and chauvinism, turning them into “nightmares of the past”.

This can only happen through a peaceful, viable and working solution to the Cyprus problem, President Christofias concluded.

Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkish troops invaded and occupied its northern third. A new round of peace talks