Seeing What's Missing in Memories of Cyprus

Most Cypriots have experienced or inherited vivid memories of momentous times in the island's troubled history. For Turkish Cypriots, the years between 1963 and 1974 are central to their remembrance of conflict, as these were the trying times when life was largely restricted to fortified, impoverished ethnic enclaves. Thousands fled the island whereas those that remained lived in fear of being attacked by extremists. Greek Cypriots concentrate their memories on 1974, when Turkey invaded and partitioned the island in response to a coupled by Greek Cypriot ultra-nationalists and sponsored by the dictatorship in Greece. As a result, roughly a third of the population was internally displaced and the northern 40 percent of the island fell under Turkish control in a war referred to by Greek Cypriots as "the catastrophe." Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.