I am particularly honoured to be invited to join you today at the festive celebrations of the city of Larnaca, jointly organised by the Municipality, the Organizing Committee of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports and Youth, the Educational Organizations PDED, OELMEK and OLTEK, as well as the Holy Metropolis of Kition in order to commemorate the national anniversary of April 1, 1955-59.
From the outset I would like to thank you and at the same time congratulate you for your actions, which highlight with brilliance and respect the ethos of a beautiful Struggle, of which we all feel proud.
Today we commemorate the national anniversary of April 1, 1955, the 67th anniversary of the beginning of the liberation struggle and we remember our heroic dead and all those who fought to throw off the English yoke and the freedom of our island.
After many years of oppression, Cypriot Hellenism stood up and with unity, unity and courage resisted the ruthless conqueror. The entire militant action was written with the sacrifices of the mainly young children of Cyprus, who claimed at all costs the liberation and the union with Greece.
At dawn on April 1, 1955, the explosions that vibrated the atmosphere were not an April Fool's lie. They were cries of freedom, declaring the great truth of the uprising of the Greeks of Cyprus to claim their inalienable right to live in freedom. The first proclamation of Chief Digenis, issued on that very day, stated: "With the help of God, with faith in our honest struggle, with the support of all Hellenism and with the help of the Cypriots, we undertake the struggle to throw off the English yoke".
This struggle of the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters EOKA was an unequal confrontation with the mighty English colonialists, which proved that the people of Cyprus had enormous reserves of mental strength to defend their sacred and just rights.
The Cypriot Hellenism, with the blessings of the political leader of the Struggle, Archbishop Makarios, and the military guidance of Chief Digenes, responded enthusiastically to the call of the homeland.
With high spirits, children and teenage students organized demonstrations, ordinary people, peasants, workers, employees and students turned into expert guerrillas, hid wanted fighters in their homes, young girls formed associations and undertook dangerous missions. The struggle was for all of them their first concern. Threats, house arrests, searches, searches, detention, imprisonment, torture and hangings did not succeed in diminishing the militancy or lowering the moral courage of our people.
Our national poet Dionysios Solomos writes characteristically in the first stanza of his leading work "Free Besieged". The heroic figures of our small island, with faith in universal human values, brought forth the Great Essences and wrote their own history, leaving us as a sacred legacy acts of unparalleled courage, heroism and undaunted patriotism, which teach and illuminate our own lives.
"I will fight and die like a Greek, but they will not take me alive" said the legend of Machaera, Grigoris Afxentiou. He fought the English alone from his hideout for ten hours and, although he knew he would die, he did not surrender. "Nothing is won without sacrifice and freedom without blood", Kyriakos Matsis stressed, while addressing his fellow students on the occasion of their graduation, he said the following: "Let us stand up to the height of our history, proud and dignified. Let us, the enslaved Cypriots, stand proud, because we have an inalienable right to do so. These two iconic figures of the Struggle, together with the defenders of the Liopetrium Barn, Pitta, Samara, Papakyriakou and Karyo, offered themselves and became a holocaust. They defended the most precious human good and turned the place of their sacrifice into a shrine of freedom.
The heroes of the gallows, with what they said or wrote just before they were led to death, move and shock.
Andreas Demetriou underlines in his last words: "I regret that I will not see our Cyprus free! But I am not afraid of death, because life is unnecessary in slavery! Long live freedom!" In his last farewell speech, Michael Karaolis writes, "I appeal to all to forgive me for everything I have done to them, as I forgive all those who have wronged me. Neither time nor space allow me to express all my thoughts and feelings of love that I now feel. Neither courage nor hopes fail us, and my peace of mind is undiminished."
James Patatsos, described as the saint of the Struggle, gives courage to his suffering mother just before the end, telling her: "My mother, I do not want you to be sorry to be deprived of me. Be proud and know that I will walk to the gallows coolly like a true Greek."
And just before the execution, he writes to her to rejoice, for he is among the angels and enjoys his labors.
Andreas Zakos writes just before his hanging: "The hour of death is approaching but in our souls there is peace of mind. At this moment we hear Beethoven's heroic symphony. In the position we are in now we cannot even with a microscope discover where there is tragedy in death."
Charilaos Michael noted: "We sing and we chant, we praise God who deserves us to die for the sake of freedom," while Stelios Mavrommatis stressed: "What shall we fear, as long as our soul shall live forever?"
Michael Koutsoftas, shortly before being led to the scaffold, said: "From the moment I heard the hour of our execution I feel my soul filled with a true joy!", and Andreas Panagidis observed that "these dark cells, once cells of horror and terror, are now cells of joy and pride."
The teenager, poet Evagoras Pallikaridis, at only 18 years old, was consciously writing a few moments before his sacrifice: "Time 7.30 pm. The most beautiful day of my life. The most beautiful hour. Don't ask why."
All this mental splendour is an example of the ethics, orientation, faith and conscious choice for struggle and sacrifice of the EOKA lads. Old men, who had an unshakeable and strong faith in God, whose presence they felt in every trial. Christ and the Virgin Mary were their true hope to draw strength and follow the right path in their mission.
Unparalleled and magnificent moments of virtue, courage and glory. The few taking on the many, the unarmed humiliating the armed. Nothing can bring the brave to their knees. All things are powerless to break their fighting spirit. Deprivations steel them. Victory fills them with modesty. The truce gives them time to regroup and philosophize.
The fighters of EOKA, as genuine descendants of Leonidas and Kolokotronis, proved that they were at all times ready for the supreme sacrifice, which they considered the finest, the noblest, the most desirable achievement they could conquer. This inactive generation, which bore the burden of the Liberation Struggle, unfolded its action everywhere, on the field of honour, fighting incessantly in hidden caves in the Troodos mountains, in fields, in small villages and towns, including Larnaca.
The city of Zeno of Kitea, reconstructing its glorious past, nurtured its own heroic children for whom it is rightly proud and proud. Men and women, young and pure, who fought and sacrificed for the freedom of their homeland.
The 25-year-old gentle, meek, modest and ideological Michalakis Paridis, who was initiated into the Struggle in 1954. He was arrested on April 1, 1955, but escaped in December 1957. He fought bravely and fell in an engagement with the British in the village of Vavla, proclaiming that "freedom fighters do not surrender. They win or die'. It was 27 August 1958.
Andreas Sourouklis, who along with his brothers, parents and wife generously offered their services to the Struggle by hosting partisans in their home. He was killed during an ambush against the British in the village of Trulli on 1 August 1958.
The student Petrakis Kyprianou, who was expelled from his school, the American Academy, when he threw EOKA leaflets and raised the Greek flag. He consciously chose to fight with the armoured British soldiers who had surrounded him in the village of Ora, on 21 March 1957, while he had only one shotgun and twenty-seven cartridges. At the funeral his mother, despite her unbearable pain, cried out: "That's the way I wanted you to be, my son, a hero." It was her answer to her son, who had written to her a few days before: "Don't worry mother, for I will never be captured, I will fall fighting". He was only 17 years old.
Heroic was also the death of the seven-year-old student, Dimitrakis Dimitriadis, "the youngest hero", according to Chief Digenis, who fell under British fire on March 14, 1956, while following a group of students in a demonstration opposite the north side of the Holy Church of St. Lazarus, where we are today. When the army car parked opposite them and armed soldiers took up positions, the older children ran away, but seven-year-old Dimitrakis stayed there, motionless in the middle of the road. In his small hands he stubbornly clutched two stones, which he threw from a distance in the direction of the soldiers. What threat to their lives did the armored English soldiers see? And yet, cruelly and ruthlessly they shot him.
The memory of little Dimitrakis was recently restored, as befits the State, by activating mechanisms for the identification and reburial of his bones, which were found in a mass grave 65 years after his murder. The shocking sacrifice of the little 'flower', dozens of years later, takes its own prominent place in the EOKA saga. A small child, weak and unable to defend himself, but conscious of his national identity, which dictated that he should respond in every way possible.
Equally important in the Struggle was the presence of ordinary women of the city of Larnaca, who through their participation showed fortitude, unprecedented resourcefulness, courage and greatness, either as mothers burying their beloved children or as members of the Organisation, undertaking dangerous missions.
Greeks,
The liberation struggle of 1955-59 is an epic of the soul, written with the sweat and blood of freedom fighters. It is an epic that taught that man is glorified only when he preserves his dignity and fights for freedom and the common good.
Of course, our Struggle did not bring the desired result, but it loses nothing of its greatness and glory. With the Treaty of Zurich - London, signed at the end of the Struggle, our country managed to free itself from the English yoke and lead to the establishment of the Republic of Cyprus, which is our main support in the difficult times our country has gone through and is going through since then until today, with the greatest tragedy being the invasion of 1974 and the burden of the Turkish occupation.
The Government has never ceased to work methodically, seeking the resumption of dialogue and the continuation of negotiations in order to achieve a workable and viable solution to our national problem, one that ensures our historical continuity and perspective.
A solution that is based on European principles and values and that safeguards the great good of peace. Unfortunately, every day we are witnessing a horrific war on European soil, unfolding in front of our screens, leaving behind untold destruction, human losses, refugees and, of course, untold pain, fear, anguish and insecurity.
From the very first moment, Cyprus, as a country that has experienced and continues to experience such sad events, reacted with empathy, condemning the Russian invasion, which clearly violates international law, expressing its solidarity and support for the Ukrainian people.
The entire European Union, to which we belong as an equal member, is making efforts to secure a ceasefire agreement that will end the bloodshed and pave the way for negotiations. The use of diplomatic channels through constructive dialogue and an end to all aggressive action is the only feasible solution to restore stability and security. And this is recognised by the entire political culture of humanity and in particular by Europe, which is united in its efforts to preserve peace in the face of new challenges and manifestations of barbarism.
It is in this context that our own reactions are activated, aimed primarily at defending our sovereignty. In addition, we consider particularly important the development by the Government of strategic alliances in various sectors, which highlight the enhanced geopolitical role that Cyprus can play and the fact that it can be a factor of stability in the wider region.
In a spirit of resistance to Turkey's conquest plans against Cyprus and Hellenism in general, we remain committed to our principles and values. We continue to seek the prevalence of human rights in our homeland and the cultivation of conditions of peaceful coexistence. It is the duty of all of us not to let oblivion, ignorance and untruth win.
Listening to the messages of the national anniversary of April 1, 1955 and the greatness of heroism with which it is identified, we too have a duty to work for the creation of a rule of law, which ideally is the only perspective and hope for young people and future generations.
We owe a minimum debt to those who fought, were tortured and sacrificed for freedom.
Long live April 1, 1955-59.
(PM/MB)
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