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For centuries, a small Mediterranean island drew the attention of some of the world’s greatest empires.
Its strategic location made it a valuable prize, but its history of conquest and foreign rule left deep divisions among its people.
Today, its capital remains divided, its former international airport stands abandoned, and a United Nations peacekeeping force patrols a boundary established over half a century ago.
Learn more about the partition of Cyprus on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
Throughout its long history, Cyprus has stood at a crossroads. Just 50 miles off the coast of Turkey, Cyprus has long been a strategic location in the Mediterranean. Most of early Cypriot history fell under foreign empires such as Assyria, Egypt, Persia, the Hellenistic Kingdoms, and the Romans.
Modern Cyprus’s story begins with the Ottoman Empire. When the Ottomans conquered Cyprus in 1570 and 1571, the island had been under Venetian rule for more than eighty years. Before that, the French Lusignan dynasty had ruled for almost three centuries, established after Richard the Lionheart’s conquest in 1191.
After the Ottoman state conquered the Island, Sultan Selim II resettled thousands of Turkish soldiers and farmers there. The Greek Cypriots were initially pleased to live under Ottoman rule, as the Ottomans ended centuries of oppressive European-style feudalism that had codified religious intolerance and economic oppression against the Greeks who had long lived there.
The Ottomans extended the millet system to the island, granting the Greek Orthodox Church religious freedom. Under the system, Turkish Muslims who migrated to the island also enjoyed the same religious freedom.
The Ottomans established administrative districts called sanjaks that functioned primarily as tax-collection units. Despite being under an Islamic government, Christian and Muslim residents lived peacefully, side by side in the same towns and neighborhoods for centuries.
Troubles for the island accelerated in the 19th century as the Ottoman Empire entered its slow decline and European powers circled its territories. As Ottoman authority weakened, the empire fell prey to the rising tide of ethnic nationalism sweeping across the Mediterranean.
In multiethnic regions like Cyprus, this shift shattered centuries of peaceful coexistence, sparking competing nationalist movements among the island’s Greek and Turkish communities.
In 1878, the British orchestrated a secret agreement called the Cyprus Convention. The convention transferred administration of Cyprus to the British, giving them a strategically important military position in the eastern Mediterranean from which they hoped to protect the Suez Canal.
While Britain assumed full administration of the island, the Ottomans technically retained sovereignty and received an annual financial tribute from the British. In exchange, the Sultan secured British military protection against future Russian assaults threatening Ottoman territories.
In July 1878, British administrators and military personnel arrived on the island and raised the Union Jack over Nicosia, the island’s capital.
Joint British-Ottoman dominion was unpopular and only inflamed the growing ethnic tensions. To meet the convention’s revenue demands, the British imposed heavy taxes on Cypriots, leaving most residents impoverished.
Worse still, neither administration used any of the revenue to improve the island. Instead, the Ottomans used the tax revenue to service their own imperial debts while ignoring the island’s need for roads, bridges, and education.
Cypriots developed a deep sense of anti-colonialism, and over time the two major ethnic groups turned to nationalism as a solution.
In 1864, the British had granted Greece control of the nearby Ionian archipelago. Greek Cypriots, in turn, came to expect that Britain would do the same with Cyprus.
Greek Cypriots, who numbered an estimated 75-80% of the population, developed a deep sense of nationalism tied to Greece and sought political union with Greece. This proposed union with Greece was known as enosis.
Unfortunately, enosis was not to be because the Ottomans were unwilling to grant it due to the importance of the tax revenue.
Meanwhile, the British considered the island essential to their Mediterranean security interests, so they established two military bases there to protect the Suez Canal from Russian interests.
The joint British-Ottoman jurisdiction lasted until 1914, when the Ottoman Empire violated the accord and joined WWI on the German side. In response, the British tore up the convention and formally annexed it as a British colony.
In their governing strategy, the British leaned into the Ottoman millet system by dealing separately with the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot populations.
The lines were drawn; the Greek Cypriots insisted on unification with Greece, and the Turkish Cypriots were terrified that Enosis would render them a persecuted minority on an island where they had lived since the 16th century.
In 1925, the British further consolidated control over Cyprus by making it a Royal Crown Colony, placing its administration directly in the hands of policymakers in London.
This move had major implications. For Greek Cypriots, enosis was clearly dead as Britain had no intention of handing the island over to Greece. Enosis began to shift from a moderate nationalist movement to a violent anti-colonial movement.
Turkish Cypriots experienced a very different situation, as in other colonies, such as India, the British pitted Greek Cypriots against Turkish Cypriots. Under the 1925 constitution, the island’s government was restructured around a legislative council, which mirrored a council set up by the British in 1882.
The legislative council’s setup outraged both sides; the Greek Christians held 12 of the 24 seats, but the 9 British seats could veto the Greeks..
Turkish Muslim Cypriots had different concerns. As a voting bloc, they received only 3 votes and had almost no ability to influence island policy. Making matters worse for the Turkish representatives, the British almost always voted with the Greek legislators, except on enosis, spending, and taxation.
Greek Cypriots were radicalized by their inability to enact change and achieve enosis, culminating in the anti-colonial riots of 1931. Known as the Oktovriana, or October Revolt, the uprising directly challenged British rule in Cyprus.
The uprising began when all of the Greek Cypriot members of the legislative council resigned en masse. The island’s primary religious leader, Nicodemus, the Greek Orthodox Bishop of Kition, called on Greek Cypriots to resist British control and to engage in a campaign of civil disobedience.
The disobedience turned violent on October 21st, as thousands of Greek Cypriots gathered in the capital, Nicosia, waving Greek flags and shouting their demands for enosis. The protests spiraled out of control as the protesters threw rocks and torches at the British Governor’s mansion, burning it to the ground.
The movement spread to other Cypriot cities as rioters attacked police stations, government buildings, and other symbols of British colonial authority. British troops from the region were quickly dispatched to put an end to the rioting, killing 6, injuring dozens, and arresting more than 2000, including the Bishop of Kition.
The British crackdown also suspended the legislative council and established absolute British control through the royal governor, further eroding the little Greek Cypriot autonomy that remained.
In an attempt to quell the unrest, the British banned political parties and public meetings, censored the press, and banned the display of the Greek flag, turning the island into a British police state. These actions backfired, and the nationalist movement went underground.
Adding to the tension, in 1950, the Greek Orthodox Church launched an unofficial national referendum in which nearly 96% of Greek Cypriots supported unification with Greece.
The nationalist movement emerged from hiding in 1955 as the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters, or as the acronym is known in Greek, EOKA. The EOKA waged a four-year armed struggle against British power in Cyprus.
To give the insurgency political legitimacy and moral authority, Orthodox Archbishop Makarios co-founded EOKA with WWII veteran Georgios Grivas.
Turkish Cypriots, on the other hand, called for the island’s partition.
Employing a successful campaign of sabotage and bombings, the movement prompted the British to send thousands of troops into Cyprus. The British often punished the young, inexperienced soldiers they caught with death, antagonizing the movement and creating martyrs of EOKA.
The struggle quickly devolved into a complex multi-sided conflict, pitting EOKA against British colonial forces while deepening the divide with the Turkish Cypriot community.
Finding no viable path to military victory or political reconciliation, Britain ultimately washed its hands of the island. In 1960, following the Zurich and London agreements, Britain granted Cyprus independence as a sovereign republic on the condition that it retain permanent sovereignty over two major military base areas.
Peace on the island turned out to be short-lived.
The new British-influenced constitution created a semi-absurd political system that required a Greek Cypriot president and a Turkish Cypriot vice-president, each with veto power over the other. The new system ensured political gridlock.
Political and ethnic unrest aside, Cyprus needed a government that worked. The island had been a ruled by a host of empires and faced profound economic problems and a dilapidated infrastructure. The new political system ensured that these problems would go unresolved.
Tensions boiled over in December 1963 during a period known as “Bloody Christmas. Intercommunal violence erupted across the island, resulting in dozens of deaths and forcing thousands of Turkish Cypriots to abandon their homes and retreat into heavily fortified, barricaded enclaves covering just a fraction of the island.
British forces under Major-General Peter Young intervened in December 1963 to separate the warring communities. Tasked with restoring peace, Young took a green wax pencil and drew a provisional ceasefire line across a map of Nicosia to separate the warring factions, creating the original “Green Line.” The UN Security Council formalized the line later that year.
The republic had fractured, setting the stage for the disastrous events of 1974.
On July 15, 1974, the military junta in Greece backed a coup in Nicosia that overthrew President Makarios and established a pro-enosis government dominated by Greek Cypriots.
Following the coup, Turkey invaded Cyprus on July 20, citing its obligation to protect Turkish Cypriots under the 1960 Treaty of Guarantee. After an initial ceasefire and failed negotiations, Turkey launched a second offensive in August, eventually occupying approximately 36% of the island.
The fighting was so intense that it displaced more than 200,000 people.
Greek Cypriots and mainland Greek forces fought against Turkish Cypriots and the invading Turkish army. The fighting raged across Nicosia, centered on control of the airport.
The UN promptly intervened at the airport, declaring it a protected area, much to the chagrin of the Turkish military, who protested to the UN Secretary-General.
After Turkey’s second offensive in August, a ceasefire took effect on August 16, 1974. The United Nations subsequently supervised a buffer zone extending approximately 180 kilometers across Cyprus, separating the Turkish-controlled north from the government-controlled south.
Although a handful of aircraft departed following the fighting, Nicosia International Airport has remained closed to commercial traffic since 1974. Its abandoned terminal and aircraft have become enduring symbols of the island’s division.
Varosha, once one of the Mediterranean’s most fashionable beach resorts, was abandoned during the Turkish invasion in 1974. For decades, its hotels, apartment buildings, and businesses stood deserted behind military fences. Almost everything in the city was left as it was the day the city was evacuated.
The partition of Cyprus reminds us that the consequences of history can endure long after the events that created them. What began as a struggle over colonial rule and national identity eventually divided an island, displaced hundreds of thousands of people, and left Europe’s last divided capital.
More than half a century later, the Green Line remains, Cyprus is split, and generations have grown up knowing only a divided homeland. Despite repeated diplomatic efforts, reunification remains elusive.
Today, Cyprus remains a stark reminder that while wars can end in a matter of weeks, the divisions they create can endure for generations.