Turkey needs to take the necessary decisions to end the plight of the relatives of the missing persons, Photiou says
Presidential Commissioner Photis Photiou said on Saturday that Cyprus is expecting the occupation force to take the political and humanitarian decisions necessary to put an end to the struggle and pain of the relatives of the missing persons.
He was speaking on Saturday during the funeral of Yiakoumi Stylianou in Larnaca, who was executed by the Turkish occupation forces in 1974 and his remains were located during excavations carried out by the Committee on Missing Persons.
He said 48 years since the 1974 Turkish invasion, “more than 750 families of missing persons are still waiting for answers about the fate of their loved ones. It is an unacceptable situation which has been causing pain for almost half a century”, he added.
“We demand and expect the occupying power to take the necessary political and humanitarian decisions to put an end to the anguish and pain of the relatives of our missing persons,” he said and stressed that, “along with the relatives of the missing, we will continue our just and honest fight to ascertain the fate of all missing persons. It is our duty and obligation”, he added.
Photiou also said President Anastasiades has repeatedly expressed “our readiness to resume negotiations on the basis of an agreed bicommunal, bizonal federation, as is defined by the relevant UN resolutions and according to the acquis Communautaire.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkish troops invaded and occupied 37% of its territory. Since then, the fate of hundreds of people remains unknown.
A Committee on Missing Persons has been established, upon agreement between the leaders of the two communities, with the scope of exhuming, identifying and returning to their relatives the remains of 492 Turkish Cypriots and 1,510 Greek Cypriots, who went missing during the inter-communal fighting of 1963-1964 and in 1974.
According to statistical data published on the CMP website by December 31, 2021 out of 2002 missing persons 1,183 were exhumed and 1,023 were identified.
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