APPLICATIONS from Turkish Cypriots for Cypriot passports have tripled in the first eight months this year.
The increase has been linked to Cyprus’ looming EU accession, and to the economic crisis in Turkey and the north. Once Cyprus joins the EU, a Cyprus passport would entitle Turkish Cypriots to unrestricted, travel, residence and employment opportunities within Europe.
Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash has forbidden Turkish Cypriots from applying for Cypriot passports and has been quoted in the north calling on Turkish Cypriots who had Cyprus passports to give them up, warning they would end up “at a loss” if they did not.
Government Spokesman Michalis Papapetrou said on Friday that Turkish Cypriot citizens of Cyprus had recently been brought before a ‘military court’ in the occupied areas and charged with possessing Cyprus passports.
Papapetrou denounced the tactics used by the Turkish Cypriot regime.
According to officials at the passport office, the number of Turkish Cypriots seeking Cyprus passports usually increases by 10-15 per cent every year, but the rate of increase so far this year has been far greater, with 817 passports already issued in the first eight months of this year, compared to 448 passports for the whole of last year and only 317 in 1999.
Many Turkish Cypriots are forced travel to other countries and apply for Cypriot passports through embassies and consulates or else submit applications through middlemen, as they cannot cross over to the south.
Costas Pilavas, who is in charge of the Nicosia passport offices, told the Sunday Mail there would probably be even more applications if there was a reliable person in the north helping Turkish Cypriots to obtain passports.
The requirements for Turkish Cypriots to get a passport are exactly the same as for Greek Cypriots. They need to prove they have Cypriot parentage and have Cypriot identity cards. Applications cost £25 and the applicant has to apply at a Cypriot Embassy or at the Nicosia passport office.
People born after 1974 can only be issued with passports if their birth certificates have been certified by doctors recognised by Cypriot government.
Turkish Cypriots made up 18 per cent of the Republic’s total population before 1974. Estimates suggest there are now around 80,000 to 90,000 Turkish Cypriots in the north, compared with just over 100,000 mainland Turks, who have settled on the island since the invasion.
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
