Turkish Cypriots said Thursday they planned to gradually open the fenced-off town of Varosha in line with a policy that will ensure the rights of property owners and the Evkaf, a Muslim charitable foundation.
Kudret Ozersay, the ‘foreign minister’ of the breakaway Turkish Cypriot state, led a tour of around 40 reporters into the area, which has been under the control of the military since August 1974, when its Greek Cypriot population fled the advancing Turkish army.
“The policy we will follow in the near future is in all possibility to gradually turn the area into a civilian area,” Ozersay told Turkish and Turkish Cypriot reporters. “What you saw yourselves today, is there a need in the 21st century for this area to remain closed, to be protected by the army?”
Turkish Cypriot authorities have been recording the immovable and movable properties in the town, including artwork and other artifacts that have been stored under lock and key.
Ozersay said there are still numerous works that have not been recorded but are being guarded. There are religious icons and objects that have been taken to the Apostolos Varnavas museum.
“They are important items of cultural heritage whose documentation is almost complete,” he said.
He said money found in cash machines were also taken to a safe place and there were also bank safes, which are guarded in situ.
Properties have been divided into tourist, commercial, and residential.
Ozersay said Varosha was a military area inside the breakaway state, a symbol of the status quo, which should not be maintained any longer.
“That is why what we are doing now has nothing to do with whether there will be negotiations with the Greek Cypriot side,” Ozersay said.
He said they have spoken to the UN about Varosha but the authority over what was happening in the area currently belonged to the Turkish Cypriot administration.
Despite efforts and UN resolutions after the 1974 Turkish invasion, residents have been unable to visit their homes in the area which has since been dubbed ‘ghost town.’
UN Security Council resolution 550 (1984) considers any attempts to settle any part of Varosha by people other than its inhabitants as inadmissible and called for the transfer of this area to the administration of the UN.
Ozersay said the resolutions where a reaction to the effort to open Varosha for settlement by Turkish Cypriots. He added that they were not talking of opening the area for Turkish Cypriots.
“Taking into consideration the human rights rules and the court decisions … we will turn a military area into a civilian one. I will be surprised if anyone tries to stop this, which takes into account the rights of the old owners and turns a military area into a civilian one.”
Ozersay said the area’s development would not be independent from the rest of Famagusta. The documentation study includes linking Varosha with the other part.
