I am delighted about this meeting and would like to congratulate you and your professors for organizing it.
This event is being held on the occasion of World Human Rights Day, which was last Friday, December 10.
It is also my belief that, in preparing for tomorrow, our young people should be aware of everything concerning our efforts to deal with the consequences of the Turkish invasion and occupation. After all, the struggle we are waging as a people and a state is aimed precisely at handing over to the younger generations a free and secure homeland, in which our young people have the prospects they deserve, to create their own lives without the burdens that exist today and that we all face.
We seek a restored homeland without armies of occupation and foreign dependencies, a homeland in which its people enjoy without exception and discrimination their human rights and basic freedoms.
It is the 47th Christmas since the calamity our country experienced in 1974. The treasonous coup brought the Turkish invasion and the destruction that followed. We are still experiencing the tragic consequences of that twin crime, in addition to the provocative and illegal threats and positions of the Turkish side, which is attempting not only to take control of the whole of Cyprus, but also to extend it to the wider Eastern Mediterranean region to the detriment of Greece and other countries.
The most tragic aspect is of course that of our missing persons. Despite our efforts through the Committee of Inquiry on Missing Persons operating under the supervision of the United Nations, despite also our official complaints and all our international intercessions and actions for the final resolution of this humanitarian problem, in order to put to rest the souls of those who have perished, but also of those of their relatives who are fatally completing their own life cycle, 781 of the 1619 Greek Cypriots and Greeks whose names have been included in the original list of the missing persons of the Cyprus tragedy are still missing.
All our strenuous efforts come up against the intransigent and inhuman attitude of Turkey, whose responsibilities are immense. With the obvious aim of covering up and silencing, if possible, its undeniable guilt for the disappearance of so many people, it is constantly putting up obstacles, hampering the investigative work to determine their fate. It places restrictions on exhumations, it refuses to cooperate in pointing out the sites where the remains of the missing persons were forcibly removed en masse precisely in order to conceal its guilt, and it also refuses to make the archives of the Turkish army available to international investigators in an attempt to finally shine a light on the truth for which we have been fighting so hard for 47 years.
Turkey has a huge responsibility for the long pending resolution of the humanitarian problem of the missing persons.
If one looks at the history of the issue, as repeatedly presented to the Security Council, the UN General Assembly and the UN Human Rights Committee, as well as to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, the European Commission of Human Rights and the European Court of Human Rights, one will find a great deal of evidence that clearly demonstrates the extent of Turkey's responsibilities.
The same in the history of efforts to launch the missing persons inquiry. It was only 24 years after its establishment, in April 1981, that the Missing Persons' Committee, which includes a representative of the United Nations, was able to begin its work.
It should be noted, in this regard, that Turkey has not participated in any of the relevant activities, and has avoided presenting its records on the missing persons or prisoners of war as required by the Geneva Convention.
Turkey's lack of any cooperation was also underlined in decisions of European legal bodies which ruled that, for any violation concerning the rights of the missing persons and their families, Turkey is responsible because of its effective control over the occupied part of Cyprus.
We do not disregard the work carried out so far by the Missing Persons' Committee, which is supported by the Government of the Republic of Cyprus in every possible way, with the aim of investigating every case of a missing person, including the number of Turkish Cypriots whose names have been included in the relevant list.
With sincerity and goodwill, our side is participating in the relevant efforts by facilitating the investigative work of the ICJ and making available to the Commission all the information at its disposal.
It should also be noted that the issue of missing persons was raised by the first two inter-state applications submitted by Cyprus against Turkey in 1974 and 1975 to the European Commission of Human Rights. In its 1976 report, the Commission found Turkey responsible for violations of numerous articles of the European Convention. There was evidence of responsibility for the fate of persons in Turkish custody in life-threatening conditions. There was also the issue of the lack of information to the families of the missing persons.
In the historic judgment of the European Court of Human Rights on 10 May 2001 on the fourth inter-state application of Cyprus against Turkey, the Court by a vote of 16-1, with the one negative vote being that of the Turkish judge, found Turkey guilty of a number of serious violations of the Convention, relating to the right to life, the right to liberty, and the prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment.
In addition to the tragic aspect of the missing persons, Turkey's flagrant violation of the European Convention on Human Rights, as well as all other relevant decisions of the international community's organizations and institutions, also concerns many other aspects of the consequences of the Turkish invasion, which were denounced in the four inter-State applications of Cyprus against Turkey.
The ultimate Turkish objective, through the tactics of ethnic cleansing which it followed and applied, was the complete Turkification of the occupied part of the island with the destruction of every element of our cultural and religious heritage and the creation of an unrecognized state entity in violation of every concept of law. Cultural monuments, churches and generally priceless treasures of our heritage have been destroyed, confiscated or turned into entertainment venues.
We are confronted with the intransigence of Turkey and its enabler regime in the occupied territories. Despite the difficulties and problems, duty obliges us to continue our efforts, bearing as a legacy our history and our national identity with the aim of handing over to you young people, as I mentioned at the beginning, a free and secure homeland for you and the families you will create.
We do not accept the finalities of the invasion and we continue the struggle for freedom and justice to prevail from end to end on our island.
We do not accept the finalities of the invasion and we continue the struggle for freedom and justice to prevail from end to end on our island. We all deserve this.
(RM/MB/EHR)
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