Cyprus-Forum.com

[Piratis]

You know Erolz, it is really funny when somebody like you, who as far as I understand has Cypriot just one of his two parents, he was born and raised abroad, and he doesn't even speak Greek or Turkish,

Find it as amusing as you like but to try and use it as a means of ignoring what I am saying because that is easier than dealing with what I am saying is youe choice. Just for you information I am according to the RoC very much a Cypriot and as much a Cypriot as you are.

I am simply saying you have no clue what Cypriot is, so trying to teach this to us is laughable. You should better go learn about the history of this island, which goes far deeper than what they taught you.

to come and tell to us that we are not Cypriots.

Again Piratis you ability to misunderstand and pervert what I am sayin is stunning in its immenseness. It is no I that is saying you are not a Cypriot people , it is you that is saying that. It is you that is saying you always were are and always will be a part of the Greek people, that happen to live in Cyprus. That is the problem and it YOUR problem.

A Cypriot is just as Greek as an Athenian or a Cretan. Does the fact that somebody is an Athenian makes him any less Greek? Or does being Greek make an Athenian less Athenian? On the contrary. The same with Cypriot. The fact that we have a small minority formed by the Ottoman rule which is not Greek does not change who we are. Such minorities where formed in most parts of the Ottoman empire.
[/quote]

So who gave you the right to tell to us what we can and what we can not be?

I am not telling you what you can and can not be , I am pointing out that YOU have no more right to tell us what we can or can not be than we do you.

I didn't tell you that. Be whatever you want to be. All I told you is that this island belongs to Cypriots, and Turkish Cypriots (or whatever you want be) are just a minority among us and therefore have no right to force their will in undemocratic ways.

If you didn't like Cyprus and Cypriots for what they really are, then you should have gone from where you came from, not to try to change Cyprus by means of mass murders and ethnic cleansing.

If you did not want to be Cypriots but actually wanted to be Greeks, then I could just as easily claim you should go to 'where you came from' , Greece, and leave Cyprus to those of us that DO and DID want to be Cypriots instead of trying to force us to become Greeks, by means that included murder and ethnic based violence along with illegality and deception when force proved insufficent for your needs.

Again, the great majority of Cypriots ARE Greeks, and this was the case when you first came to Cyprus and oppressed us for 3+ centuries, just like you did with the rest of the Greek territories.

So if you are saying that it was wrong for Cypriots to want liberation from foreign rule,

I am saying it was wrong for Cypriots who did not consider themselves a Cypriot people but in fact Greeks to try and impose foreign (Greek) rule on Cypriots who did not consider themselves Greek.

Greeks foreign to Cyprus? Thats what they teach you? Maybe Aphrodite was a foreign tourist here? Maybe the language we speak is not Greek? Maybe our culture is not Greek? The fact is that the great majority of Cypriots ARE Greek, and you knew this from the very first time you came to this island.

We didn't impose anything to you. You came to our island to be imposed on us, not the opposite.

I will ask you again: Was it wrong that the rest of the Greek islands and territories (e.g. Cretans, Peloponisians etc) that were under Ottoman rule and had some Turkish minority, became part of the Greek state? Surely if it was wrong for Cyprus, it should have been wrong for all other Greek islands and territories as well, many of which have been under Ottoman rule for much longer than Cyprus, and had Turkish minorities bigger than your 18%.

Right or wrong the fact is that these other places status was settled by international agreement seperate from Cyprus. One can indeed make very strong arguments that what happend in places like Crete was indeed VERY wrong but it is besides the point. International agreement settled the status of these places. A seperate international agreement should have alos settled the status of Cyprus, but failed to do so because those who sighed the agreements then set about with the specific aim of undermining them in the pursuit of GREEK antionalist objectives , support by those Cypriots who did not THEMSELVES consider they were Cypriot but beleived they were Greek.

What does it mean "right or wrong"? You don't know? The question is very clear: Should a Greek island/territory not have the right to be liberated from the Ottoman rule and be part of the Greek state because there is a Turkish minority on it? So what is the answer?

About your rights: You can have the 100% of the rights that all other minorities have in all other countries.

As a community we are not a minority in Cyprus. Cyprus is our homeland as it is yours. Minorities in other countries have a homeland somewhere else. TC have no other homeland than Cyprus.

Where is the homeland of the Kurdish minority of Turkey?
Are the African Americans a minority in the USA?

Can you show from where you got your definition of a "minority"? Or is this also a product of your "common sense"?

The 100% of your human rights, the 100% of your minority rights, and whatever other rights minorities get in all other countries of the world. Or maybe whats is good enough for the Greek minority in Turkey and the Turkish minority in Bulgaria is not good enough for the "children of God" the TCs?

It is not good enough for me given you tried to force my homeland, without any regard for me as a cypriot, to not exist as a state at all, for me as a people TC OR Cypriot to not exist at, to futher the aims of the foreign state of Greece, because you did not beleive you are a Cypriot but because you beleive you are a Greek. In such circumstances the above is clearly not sufficent, not because I am a child of god but because I am a CYPRIOT.

Who was forcing this island it was you, for 300+ years. The Greeks did not need to send any troops here to force anything. All that would be needed was to ask Cypriots what they want for their own island. On the contrary you forced, and you continue forcing your will against the will of Cypriots.

Can't you read? It explicitly states: "steps should be taken to transfer, unconditionally, all powers to the Trust and Non-Self-Governing Territories"
Transfer the power to the territories, and Cyprus is explicitly listed as one of the territories. Beyond that the territory could have several "peoples" but the power was not transfer to each people separately, but to the territory as a whole as it is explicitly stated. And after this was done, the people of the territory (as a whole) could decide the destiny of their territory and democratically choose any of the three legitimate options, one of which is "integration into an independent State".

THe right to self determination does not apply to territories. It applies to 'peoples'. By defining yourselves as Greek to justify enosis you defined me as 'not Greek' or as a seperate 'peoples'. So yes you have your rights as part of the Greek people to self determination in the territory you lived in after colonial rule just as I have my rights as a seperate peoples in that same territory. In a sane world where our respective rights as seperate peoples clash, compromise would be the way forward. In your world where they clash, yours take priority over mine and that is the problem.

I showed to you what the resolution said and then you start me with your own theories. We didn't need to define ourselves as anything to justify enosis. Enosis was perfectly justified for the simple fact that most Cypriots wanted it, and as the resolution shows it was one of the legitimate options.

I asked you again: Should no part of the world be allowed its self determination ..

And I tell you again the right to self determination does not apply to 'parts' of the world. It applies to peoples. When you decided to peruse Greek objectives in Cyprus rather than Cypriot ones because in your head you are always have been and always will be Greek , you excluded me and in effect confirmed me as a seperate and different peoples to you, thus establishing my equal rights as a people to yours as a people.

Says who? Your "common sense"? The Turks, like the British, French and all the other colonialist empire builders transfered their population in all areas they occupied. With decolonization those colonial populations did not become "peoples" with privileged rights on their former colonial land. They either had to adapt and become part of the local people as a minority, stay foreigners, or go back from where they came from. The same goes with the Turks in Cyprus.

So stop acting like our Ottoman ruler, start showing respect to this island and its people, assume your human, minority and the 100% of the other rights you can have like in every other democratic country, show respect to the human and democratic rights of the rest Cypriots, feel free to do whatever you want within the limits of democracy, human rights and the law, and then we can finally have peace and stability.

Start showing respect to the EU and its people, assume yopur human, minority and 100% of other rights you can have in a democratic union of states, show respect to the human and democratic rights of the rest of the EU members, feel free to do whatever you want within the limits of democracy, human rights and the law, then we can finally have stable EU where tint tails to not wag the huge dog of the rerst of the EU.

The RoC is not a minority member of the EU. The TC community as a community is not a minority member of the RoC as it was legaly drawn up and consituted and signed and agreed. I will no more accept our demotion to a 'minority' as a community within my own homeland as you would accept the RoC demotion to a 'minority' member within the EU.

EU is a union of independent countries, not a country. Cyprus is a country and within countries all citizens are equal without racist discriminations. We are not going to turn Cyprus into a South Africa of the apartheid, neither we will accept your illegal partitionist aims that want to create two separate countries in Cyprus and make the relationship that one has to another, like the relationship that Spain and Latvia have within EU. In any case I am glad you finally dropped the mask regarding your real aims.

Also, instead of going against every our effort for reconciliation and trying to antagonize us, maybe you should have appreciated the steps we are doing toward you, like abandoning our right for union with Greece,

Trying to treat me and my community like fools is not making efforts at reconcillation. You did NOT abandon your right to destroy cyprus as a state and the existance of a cypriot people as a people , regardless of the other peoples that shared CYprus with you as an act of reconcillation. What kind of fool do you take me for. It was your continued and relentless illegal and violent pusrsuit of this iherently anti Cypriot agenda even after you AGREED to abandon it that has got us to where we are today. That you now after 140+ years of fruitlessly trying to achieve this GREEK dream in Cyprus, you have deicded for now for your own reasons and in your own interest to not continue this GREEK agenda for Cyprus is NOT an act of reconcillation on your part at all.

Your hate against anything Greek is remarkable. This island has a Greek history of 3500 years. It is the history you are trying to destroy by changing the names of our villages, ethnically cleansing the real Cypriots and replacing them with Turks and destroying our churches and our cultural heritage. Either you like it or not, this island is very very Greek. Instead of trying to change Cyprus for what it really is by brute force, it would be much better if you started showing some respect instead.

Union with Greece was not a crime, but our legitimate right. We were forced to sign it away and our official policy since then has been for independence and it remains so. This doesn't mean you can force people to forget who they are and their history, and everybody is free to express his opinion and feel as they wish to feel. Thats something no foreign invader can take from us, and it is why we have survived on this island despite the many brutal and barbarian attempts by invadors like the Turks to destroy us.

Our official policy is, and remains that of independence. Apparently however, although you have also signed that you will not pursuit your illegal and criminal aim of partition, you continue with your usual crimes and illegalities as we speak.

and proposing for you rights and privilages that no other minority has in the whole world, and respond with similar steps, or at least recognize our rights as the great majority of the population of this island.

My community is not as a community merely an 'ethnic minority' in Cyprus my homeland. Not morally and not legally. You may as well tell me to stop insiting on my human rights because I am not as a TC human. You can tell me my community has no rights in its own shared homeland beyond those of a minority as many times as you like but I will not agree to this any more than I would agree I am not human. The TC community has legal rights in the RoC beyond those of a mere ethnic minority and it has them because it is more than a mere ethnic minority.

Yes, you already told us that you are the "children of God" and that you can therefore not be the same with any other minority in the whole world. What talks now is not your rights, but the 40.000 Turkish troops you have to enforce your will.

If you want your legal rights in RoC, come and get them, and give us back ours. No problem! Or maybe you only know how to demand your legal rights, but you are not also willing to respect the legal rights of others?

If you don't do that, and you spit on proposals like having 1 TC president every 5, and you insist that what we want is a country "purely run by GCs" , then the message you are sending to us is that you will stop in nothing short of partition, and any of our efforts for a peaceful resolution and reconciliation will be in vain. This will force us to withdraw and kind of goodwill as it will seem to be useless. Is that what you want? (Maybe Papadopoulos knows something)

I will accept any number of solutions that are far short of absolute partition , and as a community we have proven this. If refusing to accept that my community is and can be nothing more than a minority as a community within its own shared homeland , despite all the previous agreements that say otherwise, because YOU say this is so, is spitting on your proposals then spit I do.

As soon as you can accept the simple idea that as communites we SHARE this island , both equally as our homeland then a solution is easy to achieve. As long as you continue to maintain that your community can do what it likes in our SHARED homeland and impose that on us with no regard for our community and our wishes, we will be in deadlock.

I have no problem to share proportionately and in a democratic way, just like it exists in all other multi-ethnic countries. However what you want is to gain on the loss of our share and our rights.

You say that what you want is not partition, and yet, when I asked you for a real world example of another country, out of the many many multi-ethnic countries that exist, you couldn't give me any.

In fact, what you gave as an example for the relationship that you want between the two communities was that of the relationship between the EU countries.

So if you reject that GCs and TCs can have the kind of relationship as other ehtnic groups within countries have, but what you want is the kind of relationship that exists between countries, then it becomes crystal clear what you want, regardless of how you choose to label it. There is really no use in trying to hide what is so obvious. It is the same old taksim/partition aim that you TCs have since the 50s, and you have not abandoned since.

[denizaksulu]

You know Erolz, it is really funny when somebody like you, who as far as I understand has Cypriot just one of his two parents, he was born and raised abroad, and he doesn't even speak Greek or Turkish,

Find it as amusing as you like but to try and use it as a means of ignoring what I am saying because that is easier than dealing with what I am saying is youe choice. Just for you information I am according to the RoC very much a Cypriot and as much a Cypriot as you are.

I am simply saying you have no clue what Cypriot is, so trying to teach this to us is laughable. You should better go learn about the history of this island, which goes far deeper than what they taught you.

to come and tell to us that we are not Cypriots.

Again Piratis you ability to misunderstand and pervert what I am sayin is stunning in its immenseness. It is no I that is saying you are not a Cypriot people , it is you that is saying that. It is you that is saying you always were are and always will be a part of the Greek people, that happen to live in Cyprus. That is the problem and it YOUR problem.

A Cypriot is just as Greek as an Athenian or a Cretan. Does the fact that somebody is an Athenian makes him any less Greek? Or does being Greek make an Athenian less Athenian? On the contrary. The same with Cypriot. The fact that we have a small minority formed by the Ottoman rule which is not Greek does not change who we are. Such minorities where formed in most parts of the Ottoman empire.

So who gave you the right to tell to us what we can and what we can not be?

I am not telling you what you can and can not be , I am pointing out that YOU have no more right to tell us what we can or can not be than we do you.

I didn't tell you that. Be whatever you want to be. All I told you is that this island belongs to Cypriots, and Turkish Cypriots (or whatever you want be) are just a minority among us and therefore have no right to force their will in undemocratic ways.

If you didn't like Cyprus and Cypriots for what they really are, then you should have gone from where you came from, not to try to change Cyprus by means of mass murders and ethnic cleansing.

If you did not want to be Cypriots but actually wanted to be Greeks, then I could just as easily claim you should go to 'where you came from' , Greece, and leave Cyprus to those of us that DO and DID want to be Cypriots instead of trying to force us to become Greeks, by means that included murder and ethnic based violence along with illegality and deception when force proved insufficent for your needs.

Again, the great majority of Cypriots ARE Greeks, and this was the case when you first came to Cyprus and oppressed us for 3+ centuries, just like you did with the rest of the Greek territories.

So if you are saying that it was wrong for Cypriots to want liberation from foreign rule,

I am saying it was wrong for Cypriots who did not consider themselves a Cypriot people but in fact Greeks to try and impose foreign (Greek) rule on Cypriots who did not consider themselves Greek.

Greeks foreign to Cyprus? Thats what they teach you? Maybe Aphrodite was a foreign tourist here? Maybe the language we speak is not Greek? Maybe our culture is not Greek? The fact is that the great majority of Cypriots ARE Greek, and you knew this from the very first time you came to this island.

We didn't impose anything to you. You came to our island to be imposed on us, not the opposite.

I will ask you again: Was it wrong that the rest of the Greek islands and territories (e.g. Cretans, Peloponisians etc) that were under Ottoman rule and had some Turkish minority, became part of the Greek state? Surely if it was wrong for Cyprus, it should have been wrong for all other Greek islands and territories as well, many of which have been under Ottoman rule for much longer than Cyprus, and had Turkish minorities bigger than your 18%.

Right or wrong the fact is that these other places status was settled by international agreement seperate from Cyprus. One can indeed make very strong arguments that what happend in places like Crete was indeed VERY wrong but it is besides the point. International agreement settled the status of these places. A seperate international agreement should have alos settled the status of Cyprus, but failed to do so because those who sighed the agreements then set about with the specific aim of undermining them in the pursuit of GREEK antionalist objectives , support by those Cypriots who did not THEMSELVES consider they were Cypriot but beleived they were Greek.

What does it mean "right or wrong"? You don't know? The question is very clear: Should a Greek island/territory not have the right to be liberated from the Ottoman rule and be part of the Greek state because there is a Turkish minority on it? So what is the answer?

About your rights: You can have the 100% of the rights that all other minorities have in all other countries.

As a community we are not a minority in Cyprus. Cyprus is our homeland as it is yours. Minorities in other countries have a homeland somewhere else. TC have no other homeland than Cyprus.

Where is the homeland of the Kurdish minority of Turkey?
Are the African Americans a minority in the USA?

Can you show from where you got your definition of a "minority"? Or is this also a product of your "common sense"?

The 100% of your human rights, the 100% of your minority rights, and whatever other rights minorities get in all other countries of the world. Or maybe whats is good enough for the Greek minority in Turkey and the Turkish minority in Bulgaria is not good enough for the "children of God" the TCs?

It is not good enough for me given you tried to force my homeland, without any regard for me as a cypriot, to not exist as a state at all, for me as a people TC OR Cypriot to not exist at, to futher the aims of the foreign state of Greece, because you did not beleive you are a Cypriot but because you beleive you are a Greek. In such circumstances the above is clearly not sufficent, not because I am a child of god but because I am a CYPRIOT.

Who was forcing this island it was you, for 300+ years. The Greeks did not need to send any troops here to force anything. All that would be needed was to ask Cypriots what they want for their own island. On the contrary you forced, and you continue forcing your will against the will of Cypriots.

Can't you read? It explicitly states: "steps should be taken to transfer, unconditionally, all powers to the Trust and Non-Self-Governing Territories"
Transfer the power to the territories, and Cyprus is explicitly listed as one of the territories. Beyond that the territory could have several "peoples" but the power was not transfer to each people separately, but to the territory as a whole as it is explicitly stated. And after this was done, the people of the territory (as a whole) could decide the destiny of their territory and democratically choose any of the three legitimate options, one of which is "integration into an independent State".

THe right to self determination does not apply to territories. It applies to 'peoples'. By defining yourselves as Greek to justify enosis you defined me as 'not Greek' or as a seperate 'peoples'. So yes you have your rights as part of the Greek people to self determination in the territory you lived in after colonial rule just as I have my rights as a seperate peoples in that same territory. In a sane world where our respective rights as seperate peoples clash, compromise would be the way forward. In your world where they clash, yours take priority over mine and that is the problem.

I showed to you what the resolution said and then you start me with your own theories. We didn't need to define ourselves as anything to justify enosis. Enosis was perfectly justified for the simple fact that most Cypriots wanted it, and as the resolution shows it was one of the legitimate options.

I asked you again: Should no part of the world be allowed its self determination ..

And I tell you again the right to self determination does not apply to 'parts' of the world. It applies to peoples. When you decided to peruse Greek objectives in Cyprus rather than Cypriot ones because in your head you are always have been and always will be Greek , you excluded me and in effect confirmed me as a seperate and different peoples to you, thus establishing my equal rights as a people to yours as a people.

Says who? Your "common sense"? The Turks, like the British, French and all the other colonialist empire builders transfered their population in all areas they occupied. With decolonization those colonial populations did not become "peoples" with privileged rights on their former colonial land. They either had to adapt and become part of the local people as a minority, stay foreigners, or go back from where they came from. The same goes with the Turks in Cyprus.

So stop acting like our Ottoman ruler, start showing respect to this island and its people, assume your human, minority and the 100% of the other rights you can have like in every other democratic country, show respect to the human and democratic rights of the rest Cypriots, feel free to do whatever you want within the limits of democracy, human rights and the law, and then we can finally have peace and stability.

Start showing respect to the EU and its people, assume yopur human, minority and 100% of other rights you can have in a democratic union of states, show respect to the human and democratic rights of the rest of the EU members, feel free to do whatever you want within the limits of democracy, human rights and the law, then we can finally have stable EU where tint tails to not wag the huge dog of the rerst of the EU.

The RoC is not a minority member of the EU. The TC community as a community is not a minority member of the RoC as it was legaly drawn up and consituted and signed and agreed. I will no more accept our demotion to a 'minority' as a community within my own homeland as you would accept the RoC demotion to a 'minority' member within the EU.

EU is a union of independent countries, not a country. Cyprus is a country and within countries all citizens are equal without racist discriminations. We are not going to turn Cyprus into a South Africa of the apartheid, neither we will accept your illegal partitionist aims that want to create two separate countries in Cyprus and make the relationship that one has to another, like the relationship that Spain and Latvia have within EU. In any case I am glad you finally dropped the mask regarding your real aims.

Also, instead of going against every our effort for reconciliation and trying to antagonize us, maybe you should have appreciated the steps we are doing toward you, like abandoning our right for union with Greece,

Trying to treat me and my community like fools is not making efforts at reconcillation. You did NOT abandon your right to destroy cyprus as a state and the existance of a cypriot people as a people , regardless of the other peoples that shared CYprus with you as an act of reconcillation. What kind of fool do you take me for. It was your continued and relentless illegal and violent pusrsuit of this iherently anti Cypriot agenda even after you AGREED to abandon it that has got us to where we are today. That you now after 140+ years of fruitlessly trying to achieve this GREEK dream in Cyprus, you have deicded for now for your own reasons and in your own interest to not continue this GREEK agenda for Cyprus is NOT an act of reconcillation on your part at all.

Your hate against anything Greek is remarkable. This island has a Greek history of 3500 years. It is the history you are trying to destroy by changing the names of our villages, ethnically cleansing the real Cypriots and replacing them with Turks and destroying our churches and our cultural heritage. Either you like it or not, this island is very very Greek. Instead of trying to change Cyprus for what it really is by brute force, it would be much better if you started showing some respect instead.

Union with Greece was not a crime, but our legitimate right. We were forced to sign it away and our official policy since then has been for independence and it remains so. This doesn't mean you can force people to forget who they are and their history, and everybody is free to express his opinion and feel as they wish to feel. Thats something no foreign invader can take from us, and it is why we have survived on this island despite the many brutal and barbarian attempts by invadors like the Turks to destroy us.

Our official policy is, and remains that of independence. Apparently however, although you have also signed that you will not pursuit your illegal and criminal aim of partition, you continue with your usual crimes and illegalities as we speak.

and proposing for you rights and privilages that no other minority has in the whole world, and respond with similar steps, or at least recognize our rights as the great majority of the population of this island.

My community is not as a community merely an 'ethnic minority' in Cyprus my homeland. Not morally and not legally. You may as well tell me to stop insiting on my human rights because I am not as a TC human. You can tell me my community has no rights in its own shared homeland beyond those of a minority as many times as you like but I will not agree to this any more than I would agree I am not human. The TC community has legal rights in the RoC beyond those of a mere ethnic minority and it has them because it is more than a mere ethnic minority.

Yes, you already told us that you are the "children of God" and that you can therefore not be the same with any other minority in the whole world. What talks now is not your rights, but the 40.000 Turkish troops you have to enforce your will.

If you want your legal rights in RoC, come and get them, and give us back ours. No problem! Or maybe you only know how to demand your legal rights, but you are not also willing to respect the legal rights of others?

If you don't do that, and you spit on proposals like having 1 TC president every 5, and you insist that what we want is a country "purely run by GCs" , then the message you are sending to us is that you will stop in nothing short of partition, and any of our efforts for a peaceful resolution and reconciliation will be in vain. This will force us to withdraw and kind of goodwill as it will seem to be useless. Is that what you want? (Maybe Papadopoulos knows something)

I will accept any number of solutions that are far short of absolute partition , and as a community we have proven this. If refusing to accept that my community is and can be nothing more than a minority as a community within its own shared homeland , despite all the previous agreements that say otherwise, because YOU say this is so, is spitting on your proposals then spit I do.

As soon as you can accept the simple idea that as communites we SHARE this island , both equally as our homeland then a solution is easy to achieve. As long as you continue to maintain that your community can do what it likes in our SHARED homeland and impose that on us with no regard for our community and our wishes, we will be in deadlock.

I have no problem to share proportionately and in a democratic way, just like it exists in all other multi-ethnic countries. However what you want is to gain on the loss of our share and our rights.

You say that what you want is not partition, and yet, when I asked you for a real world example of another country, out of the many many multi-ethnic countries that exist, you couldn't give me any.

In fact, what you gave as an example for the relationship that you want between the two communities was that of the relationship between the EU countries.

So if you reject that GCs and TCs can have the kind of relationship as other ehtnic groups within countries have, but what you want is the kind of relationship that exists between countries, then it becomes crystal clear what you want, regardless of how you choose to label it. There is really no use in trying to hide what is so obvious. It is the same old taksim/partition aim that you TCs have since the 50s, and you have not abandoned since.[/quote]


Piratis sez:
Again, the great majority of Cypriots ARE Greeks, and this was the case when you first came to Cyprus and oppressed us for 3+ centuries, just like you did with the rest of the Greek territories.


I would be greatful if you could give us the census reports for the year 1571. Then I for one would believe this sentence. I do not dispute the fact that there were Greeks speakers on the island but I am interested in the Venetian and French landowners who owned the peasants and land before the Ottomans arrived. With your immense sources which I envyplease oblige.

[Piratis]

I would be greatful if you could give us the census reports for the year 1571. Then I for one would believe this sentence. I do not dispute the fact that there were Greeks speakers on the island but I am interested in the Venetian and French landowners who owned the peasants and land before the Ottomans arrived. With your immense sources which I envyplease oblige.

I don't think they were making census back then, not in Cyprus at least. Here is some info from the Country Studies of Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress of the USA. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/cytoc.html

During the long Lusignan period and the eighty-two years of Venetian control, foreign rulers unquestionably changed the Cypriot way of life, but it was the Cypriot peasant with his Greek religion and Greek culture who withstood all adversity. Throughout the period, almost three centuries, there were two distinct societies, one foreign and one native. The first society consisted primarily of Frankish nobles with their retinues and Italian merchants with their families and followers. The second society, the majority of the population, consisted of Greek Cypriot serfs and laborers. Each of these societies had its own culture, language, and religion. Although a decided effort was made to supplant native customs and beliefs, the effort failed.

[/quote]

[denizaksulu]

I would be greatful if you could give us the census reports for the year 1571. Then I for one would believe this sentence. I do not dispute the fact that there were Greeks speakers on the island but I am interested in the Venetian and French landowners who owned the peasants and land before the Ottomans arrived. With your immense sources which I envyplease oblige.

I don't think they were making census back then, not in Cyprus at least. Here is some info from the Country Studies of Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress of the USA. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/cytoc.html

During the long Lusignan period and the eighty-two years of Venetian control, foreign rulers unquestionably changed the Cypriot way of life, but it was the Cypriot peasant with his Greek religion and Greek culture who withstood all adversity. Throughout the period, almost three centuries, there were two distinct societies, one foreign and one native. The first society consisted primarily of Frankish nobles with their retinues and Italian merchants with their families and followers. The second society, the majority of the population, consisted of Greek Cypriot serfs and laborers. Each of these societies had its own culture, language, and religion. Although a decided effort was made to supplant native customs and beliefs, the effort failed.

[/quote]

Thank you for that 'evidence'. No Domsday book then. What a pity.

Thank You agin
Regards
Deniz

[zan]

[Piratis]

Deniz, if you are really interested about that period I could find more info for you. I gave you the above since it doesn't come from a Cypriot source, since apparently according to some we are not allowed to record our own history and any such source would be rejected by them.

[denizaksulu]

Deniz, if you are really interested about that period I could find more info for you. I gave you the above since it doesn't come from a Cypriot source, since apparently according to some we are not allowed to record our own history and any such source would be rejected by them.

Piratis, thank you I am sure you are being helpful. I appreciate all the information you may provide. I have a few sources but for trivial reasons I cant lay my hands on them at the mo. So I am currently perusing through Sir George Hill 'A history of Cyprus Vol III which covers the Frankish Period, in order to refresh my memory, as it has been so long since I last read it.
I am particularly interested in the 'Frankish' Families that remained after 1571. The study of their 'Coats of Arms on various buildings around Nicosia and Famagusta is very interesting. I am sure the Coats of Arms exist in other towns of OUR Cyprus but have not had the chance to explore. At this rate I probably never will.

Regards
Deniz

[Get Real!]

Deniz, if you are really interested about that period I could find more info for you.

Let him do his own bloody research! What next feed them?

[erolz]

I am simply saying you have no clue what Cypriot is, so trying to teach this to us is laughable. You should better go learn about the history of this island, which goes far deeper than what they taught you.

Actually you are attacking me as a person rather than my arguments. Not uncommon.

A Cypriot is just as Greek as an Athenian or a Cretan.

No he is not. Firstly not all Cypriots are Greek Cypriots. Even if you say a GC is as Greek as an Athenian or Cretan you would be wrong because those Greeks are Greek by nationality as well as culture and you are Greek only by culture despite what you may personally wish.

I didn't tell you that. Be whatever you want to be.

You constantly tell me that your community alone with no regard for mine has the RIGHT not only tell what nationality I will be, but also if my homeland will exist at all as a state.

All I told you is that this island belongs to Cypriots, and Turkish Cypriots (or whatever you want be) are just a minority among us and therefore have no right to force their will in undemocratic ways.

We as a community are founding partners of the state of the RoC and morally as well as legally we have a right as a community to stop you imposing your purely communal will on us against ours. That is a right to STOP imposition not gain it. It is you that argues the right to impose one communities will on the other in Cyprus belongs to the GC community. I say neither has the RIGHT to impose its will, on issue that are communal in their very nature, on the other. You say GC have the right to impose their will on TC. Spot the difference?

Again, the great majority of Cypriots ARE Greeks, ...

I have no problem with the majority of Cypriots being culturally linked to Greece and Culturally Greek. I do have a problem when they tell me that my homeland will not exist as a state and my nationality will be Greek and I have no say in this at all, because that is what they want for the future of my homeland that I share with them.

Greeks foreign to Cyprus?

A Greek national is a foreigner in Cyprus. I am not a foreigner in Cyprus.

We didn't impose anything to you.

Not only did you try and impose enosis on my community in our shared homeland you did so with violence and illegality AND you claim that you had and have the RIGHT to do so.

Where is the homeland of the Kurdish minority of Turkey?

The Kurds, in Turkey or elsewhere do not have a homeland and they should have one.

Are the African Americans a minority in the USA?

As far as African Americans are African, they do have an African homeland.

The Greeks did not need to send any troops here to force anything.

Well ignoring the patent ancient historical nonsense of that statement, there is the small matter of up to 20,000 mainland Greek troops illegally introduced into Cyprus, documented by the UN, to help 'defend' Cyprus by aiding in military attacks by an already numerically dominant GC community in control of all the organs of the state against the TC community in the 60's. A time when you had 'officially' forgone the pursuit of enosis as a great 'concession' !

All that would be needed was to ask Cypriots what they want for their own island.

No Piratis what was needed was to only ask GREEK Cypriots what they wanted for their island and simply ignore that they SHARED this island with people who were not GREEK Cypriot.

I showed to you what the resolution said and then you start me with your own theories. We didn't need to define ourselves as anything to justify enosis. Enosis was perfectly justified for the simple fact that most Cypriots wanted it, and as the resolution shows it was one of the legitimate options.

Look Piratis I cannot be held responsible for the fact that you are unable (or more likely unwilling) to understand the right to self determination of peoples as laid out in the UN charters. If you read these charters it is absolutely clear that the right to self determination belongs to peoples and not to geographical areas or territories.

Says who? Your "common sense"?

No pirates, says the UN charters where the right to self determination of peoples are clearly and plainly laid out. One has only to find them , read them and understand them - something that apparently is beyond you.

The Turks, like the British, French and all the other colonialist empire builders transfered their population in all areas they occupied. With decolonization those colonial populations did not become "peoples" with privileged rights on their former colonial land. They either had to adapt and become part of the local people as a minority, stay foreigners, or go back from where they came from. The same goes with the Turks in Cyprus.

Let me get this straight. You are SERIOUSLY claiming that those Europeans that colonised America and Australia had to 'either adapt and become part of the local people as a minority, stay foreigners, or go back from where they came from’? Try telling that to the indigenous people of those places! Do you have any idea how stupid that sounds?

You can in fact divide colonisation into two sorts. Colonisation where the colonisers culturally and or physically destroyed those cultures and peoples that existed in the colonised area before the arrival of the colonisers to such an extent that those indigenous cultures and peoples could no longer function as viable people or cultures any more or even ceased to exist entirely. In such colonisation it was indeed the colonisers that went on to become the people of those colonised places. The Greek cultural and physical colonisation of Cyprus and the peoples and cultures that existed there before the arrival of this Greek cultural and physical colonisation, was of this type.
The other type of colonisation was where the colonisers did not culturally and physically destroy what was there before their arrival. This was the type of colonisation that the Ottomans did in Cyprus, during the same period of history when the Europeans were practising the former type in America and Australia and other places around the world.

Both Geek Culture and Turkish culture in Cyprus were a result of colonisation. Greek colonisation happened thousands of years before Ottoman colonisation in Cyprus and was the type of colonisation that left nothing of consequence of what went before this colonisation, culturally or as separate peoples. Ottoman colonisation happened much later and was of the type that did leave significant amounts of what went before both culturally and in terms of separate peoples.

EU is a union of independent countries, not a country.

And the RoC as a state was formed as a union of two communites.

Your hate against anything Greek is remarkable.

I do not hate 'anything Greek' just because it is Greek at all. I do hate what was done to Cyprus by some GC in the name of destroying Cyprus as a state and a people in order to make it a part of Greece but I do not blame Greeks for that stupidity in the first instance I blame those Cypriots that did what they could to destroy Cyprus as a nation and in the process damaged, perhaps irreparably, the chance of all Cypriots building a Cypriot nation together.
You hatred of anything Turkish, including TC is palpable and plain Piratis.

This island has a Greek history of 3500 years.

And before that is had a 7000 year history of cultures and peoples that were destroyed and replaced by the Greek cultural and physical invasion of Cyprus.

Either you like it or not, this island is very very Greek.

I have no problem with Cyprus having majority cultural links with Greece. These cultural links are the cultural links that along with the Turkish cultural links and traces of a multitude of others are the wondrous threads that weave together to create that unique thing that is Cyprus. I like this for I am a Cypriot and this is my cultural heritage. What I do not like is when you come to me and say, Cyprus will not exist as a state only Greece will exist, Cypriots will not exist as a people only Greeks who happen to live in Cyprus, Cyprus will not exist as a nation that reflects all of the wondrous parts that make it uniquely Cypriot only the Greek nation will exist, and you have NO SAY in this, for I am Greek and I will decide alone our future in these matters. That I do have a problem with, because actually I am a Cypriot patriot, not a Turkish or Greek patriot.

Union with Greece was not a crime, but our legitimate right.

As far as it was your right, as an expression of self-determination, it was your right only as GC or Greeks. It was not your right as an expression of self-determination of a single unitary CYPRIOT people. As it was your right to want enosis, it was our right as a separate people sharing the same island as you as our mutual homeland to resist it, as an expression of OUR right to self determination as a people.

We were forced to sign it away and our official policy since then has been for independence and it remains so.

You resisted 3500 years of brutal oppression by foreign powers yet you were forced to sign the 60's agreements against your will as Greeks living in Cyprus. Nonsense. Makarios CHOSE to sign those agreements because he mistakenly believed they would bring him closer to his real aim and he could ignore and renege on them without serious consequence. As far as history shows an 'official policy' on the part of GC leaderships, it shows one of agreeing to forgo enosis on paper and in word, whilst at the same time in deed secretly working to achieve it regardless of any legality or consequence and this you claim was the big GC compromise!

... and it is why we have survived on this island despite the many brutal and barbarian attempts by invadors like the Turks to destroy us.

If the ottomans had invaded Cyprus with the intent of destroying Greek Cypriots culturally and as a people , then they would have achieved that. You own your continued existence culturally as Greeks and as a GC people is due as much to the reality that this was NOT the Ottomans objective in invading Cyprus as to your superhuman abilities to cling to your Greek culture.

If you want your legal rights in RoC, come and get them, and give us back ours. No problem!

It is because of the GC leaderships determination to remove the TC communities legal rights as a community in Cyprus in illegal ways, ignoring its own supreme court, making secret plans for such illegal removal by deception and use of violent force where necessary and by empowering brutal thugs like Yiorjardis to recruit and run ethnic armed militias to bring ethnic based violence down on TC, in turn empowering partitionist elements within the TC community, that we are where we are today. And now you tell me, after having yourself becomes the victims of the consequences of this behaviour of your leadership, to come and get these SAME rights 'no problem'. The problem IS that you ALREADY tried to take these rights from us with no regard for legality AND you still argue that actually even though we have these right 'on paper' in reality we have no right to these rights in reality. That is the problem.

I have no problem to share proportionately and in a democratic way, ...

Of course you have no problem with this because what it means is that any time you as Greeks and not Cypriots decide you want to impose something on Cyprus as Greeks, you have the right to do so with no regard for what TC as Cypriots may want for their homeland. It is exactly because you historically tried to impose purely Greek wishes on all Cypriots in the past with no regard for Cyprus as a state or a nation or a people or for those that you share Cyprus with and their wishes, that you can not ALONE as Greeks, be trusted with the future of Cyprus. Only as Cypriots (people who believe in a Cypriot nation and a Cypriot people) can you so be trusted.

In fact, what you gave as an example for the relationship that you want between the two communities was that of the relationship between the EU countries.

I do not give it an example of a solution for Cyprus. I give it as an example where as a matter of a principal of democracy in order for there to BE democracy, there are times when the right unit of democracy is NOT simply the individual. Within the EU there is a REASON why on may issues the unit of democracy is not the individual but the state and the reason is to protect smaller states from the dominance of larger ones WITHIN a democratic framework. Just as within Cyprus, if there was the will, the same mechanism of democracy could be used for the same reason and be as democratic as a matter of principal as the EU is. In Cyprus there could be a system where for matters that are delineated on purely or almost purely communal lines the best unit of democracy would be the community (or the federal units principally representing those communities) and not the individual, that was by principal a democratic system and no more allowed the TC community to impose anything on the GC one than the ROC veto in the EU allows them to impose anything on Germany or the EU in general.
Of course you oppose such in every way you possibly can because for you it is the right of the GC community even on matters purely delineated along communal lines to impose its communal will on the TC community , even when those desires are themselves anti Cypriot (as a state, as a nation, as a people) in there very essence.

....then it becomes crystal clear what you want, regardless of how you choose to label it.

Actually Piratis what I really want more than anything else is a Cyprus where you were able to consider me MORE of your kinsman and compatriot than you consider a Greek from mainland Greece as such and where it was as, if not more, important to you to consider my wishes as a CYPRIOT to yours as a Greek living in Cyprus. This is what I want but I do not think it is within your as an individual to grant this wish, yet I live in hope that if not today one day it will be in enough CYPRIOTS hearts to grant this GC to TC and TC to GC.

Anyway I would like to say this brief return to the forums has been fun, but I would be a liar if I said so. I will not be continuing this kind of discussion here for the foreseeable future. I may make the occasionally fun poking post now and again but for my own sanity and maintenance of hope for a better future for all Cypriots I will essentially be withdrawing from such debates like this here.

[zan]

Piratis wrote:
The Greeks did not need to send any troops here to force anything.

erolz wrote:
Well ignoring the patent ancient historical nonsense of that statement, there is the small matter of up to 20,000 mainland Greek troops illegally introduced into Cyprus, documented by the UN, to help 'defend' Cyprus by aiding in military attacks by an already numerically dominant GC community in control of all the organs of the state against the TC community in the 60's. A time when you had 'officially' forgone the pursuit of enosis as a great 'concession' !

erolz I commend your patience and your cool head with this guy. Blatant lies coming from Piratis shows the world what we have to put up with.