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Our presence today, in this holy Temple, is the minimum sign of honour and recognition of the sacrifice of the heroes we commemorate. Today, as humble pilgrims, we recall memories, we walk through the historical sequence of the martyrdom moments that led our heroes to eternity.
It is moments like today's that time and space acquire an abstract meaning.
It is moments like today's that time and space acquire an abstract meaning. Feeling the pages of history, our minds travel freely, without barbed wire and barriers, to our unforgettable and beloved occupied villages, to the enchanting and dreamy shores of Famagusta, Kyrenia and Morphou. In the castles of Pentadaktylos, in Agios Hilarion, in Voufavento. In the monasteries of Apostles Andrew and Barnabas, in the places where hundreds of our compatriots lived, fought and sacrificed. Dead and missing, refugees and trapped, protagonists of a merciless modern tragedy, a tragedy that is still searching for catharsis and redemption.
In the history of our martyred homeland, there are not a few moments of pain, terror and drama. But 12 June 1958 left a terrible mark on Cyprus, where eight Greek Cypriots from the village of Kontenos were slaughtered in cold blood. The details of the crime are gruesome.
The people of Kontemeniotes, peace-loving people, had never come into conflict with Turkish Cypriots from neighbouring villages. And in the mixed village of Skullura, its 500 Greek Cypriots and 300 Turkish Cypriots lived peacefully without ever coming into conflict. But a few days before the fateful June 12, the Greek Cypriot residents realized that guards had been posted on the borders of the Turkish Cypriot sector of the village, controlling all movements.
It was a Thursday. Around noon information reached the village - accidentally or not - that in the neighbouring village of Skullura the Greek residents of the village had been attacked by their Turkish Cypriot compatriots. The Turkish Cypriots in the café in the village of Skylloura heard an inflammatory speech by their leader Fazil Koutsiuk being broadcast on the Ankara radio station. They began to gather along the Greek sector of the village "armed with machetes, axes, rods and pitchforks" according to testimonies.
The residents of Kontenou rushed to help. About thirty-five people boarded two trucks. Before they even approached the village of Skylura, British troops intervened, who, under the pretext of taking them away for questioning, forced them to board military trucks. But they had other plans. Instead of taking them to their village, they quite unjustifiably forced them to disembark in the fields outside the Turkish Cypriot village of Kioneli and told them to walk to their village. A little further down the road the Turkish Cypriot extremists had ambushed them.
There, in the fields between the villages of Kioneli and Orga Kiyiou, one of the darkest, most brutal pages in our history was written. Events unfolded rapidly. Panicked, the Kontenenians began to run to save themselves from the massacre, when a crowd of Turks, armed with clubs and agricultural tools, attacked them. Several were wounded, eight Contemenians were killed. All this under the criminally impassive gaze of the British military forces.
The eight Contemenians who were massacred are.
The next day "Haravgi", with three gruesome photos on the front page, reports: "Into these shapeless masses were transformed the inhabitants of Kontenou, massacred by Turkish vandals." Moments of ancient drama followed in the village. The soil of the chaotic Kontenou in the following days would cover its dead. In successive funerals, funeral processions, kneeling residents paid their last respects. Mourning and heartbreak engulf the village and the whole of Cyprus. The community mourned, but held back its anger. Worse incidents were thus avoided.
A few months after the atrocity of 12 June 1958, Cyprus would gain its independence. The epic of 55-59 succeeded in throwing off the British yoke and our country gained its independence. An independence unfortunately vulnerable to pursuits and hatched plans for destabilisation.
The clouds are not far behind. After the "bloody Christmas" of '63, Nicosia finds itself separated from the "green line". The conflicts are spreading.
The intensification and provocations of the Turkish rebels are a daily occurrence.
The black July of 1974, linked to the tragic events of the traitorous coup and the Turkish invasion, marks the history of our long-suffering island. Nikolaos Flourentzou, only 18 years old, was serving in the 281 Infantry Battalion, which was stationed in Myrtou. During the traitorous coup, he was called with his unit to suppress the resistance of the defenders of the Republic in Paphos. Nicholas' superiors ordered him to shoot at his compatriots. Despite his young age, he refused to obey and consented to the high treason of turning against the Republic he had sworn to serve. The heroic resistance of just eighteen-year-old Nicholas is a signpost and compass of fortitude, courage and conscience. Nikolaos and his family paid a heavy price by defending the Fatherland and the Republic.
Aristophanes Andreou was preparing to go to England to study after his service in the National Guard, but the coup and the Turkish invasion thwarted his plans. A soldier of the 33rd Commando Squadron, he fought heroically against the Turkish troops at Agios Georgios and on the coast of Kyrenia. On the outskirts of Pendadactylos, outside the village of Templos alone against many he did not bend, he fought to the end defending the sacred soil of his homeland. The lad's body remained buried for 35 years in the bloody soil of Kyrenia. His fate remained undetermined in the brutal list of the missing. His family endured the agony of waiting, but they stood up to the news of the discovery of his remains using DNA.
Two other scions of Kontenou, who fought heroically against the Turkish invaders, still remain on the list of the missing. They are Nikolaos Papachristodoulou, Lance Corporal of the 33rd Ranger Squadron, who fought the Turkish invaders on the coast of Kyrenia, and Andreas Constantinou, a soldier of the 281 Infantry Battalion who fought the Turks in the battles of 5 Mili, Lapithos and Karavas.
Also missing are two Kontenenians who were civilians in July 1974. They are Pantelis Hadjichristoforou and his son Christakis Hadjichristoforou, who perished in the area of Kormakitis in Liberia.
The Cyprus we live in today is not the homeland envisioned by the heroes we commemorate. It is not the one for which they fought and sacrificed.
The commemoration of our glorious heroes is a reminder to intensify our efforts with determination. We reiterate this unwavering determination.
As the President of the Republic, Mr. Nikos Christodoulides, has declared, our main concern is to work with all our forces to achieve a solution for an independent and truly sovereign state, free of any anachronistic guarantees and the presence of occupying troops. We are working for the end of the occupation, the reunification of our homeland through the achievement of a peaceful solution to the Cyprus problem. We remain firmly committed to a comprehensive solution to the Cyprus problem on the basis of the relevant United Nations resolutions, with one sovereignty, one citizenship, one international personality, always in accordance with the relevant United Nations resolutions, the European acquis and of course the principles and values on which the European Union is founded.
With reverence and undiminished commitment we will continue to devote every bit of our energies to building a Cyprus that will be a symbol of peace, stability and progress in the region. A modern, European model country, safeguarding the human rights of all its inhabitants, guaranteeing hope and based on mutual respect and solidarity, ready to chart its own unique course on the map of world history.
The tragedy of the moment transcends the narrow limits of time and space. Our physical presence today in the Church of Panagia Makedonitissa is synchronized with our mental and spiritual presence in the churches of Archangel Michael, and the chapels of Prophet Elias and St. George in Kontenos. These holy churches may have been silenced, but memories and desire preserve them and today, in this interlude of mourning, pain and memory, their bells ring mournfully in our souls. Sounds of awakening and reminder of the desire to return, but also of our debt to our homeland.
We have a duty never to forget. To keep the memory unquenched. We owe it to the dead, to the families who wait patiently for the fate of their loved ones to be determined, to those who experienced captivity, desecration, the brutality of rape and torture.
The heavy legacy we honour today dictates our duty. To fight unwaveringly for the end of the occupation, the unity of the state, the safeguarding of human rights and the basic freedoms of all the Cypriot people.
Our historical responsibility cannot be limited to the mechanical reading of lists of dates and endless lists of heroes. We ought to translate the sacrifices of our heroes into our own "being". With honesty and sobriety, we must reflect on our debt to these glorious heroes and to future generations.
By turning the pages of our history, we are also looking to the future. We draw lessons, we recall memories, we understand the importance of our mission. Somewhere I read that "every man, every people, becomes worthy of his historical mission as his consciousness of his history deepens."
The greatness of a nation's civilization is always proportional to the purity and depth of its historical memory. It is our duty, therefore, to make historical memory an experience, the need of history to meet the historicity of need, the imperative for unity to be transformed into redemption.
Inspired by the heroic sacrifice of the heroes we commemorate today and all those who laid down their lives on the altar of Cypriot freedom, as well as those who fought for our homeland, let us consolidate the invincible front of unity.
Inspired by the heroic sacrifice of the heroes we commemorate today and all those who laid down their lives on the altar of Cypriot freedom, as well as those who fought for our homeland, let us consolidate the invincible front of unity. All together to look at history, the nation, the struggles and the fighters with our heads held high.
To paraphrase Palamas' words.
We will be judged by the unborn, the dead."
(Paraphrase of verses by Kostis Palamas from the poem "The Mass is not over", 1925.)
Honour to the land of Kontenmenos that gave birth, nurtured and sewed with the seeds of Hellenism and Christianity these worthy children.
Immortal heroes of Kontenos,
We honour and bow to your great sacrifice. Your memory will be eternal, as our struggle will be unceasing until the final vindication, the justification of your sacrifice.
Eternal and ageless be the luminous memory of our heroes.
(PM/AF/MS)
Contents of this article including associated images are belongs to PIO
Views & opinions expressed are those of the author and/or PIO
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