quote]Makarios usurped all power in spite of the bi-communal nature of the constitution. He presented himself on the world stage as a smiling priest-statesman, the constitutional head of Cyprus, while at home he persecuted the Turks and divested them of their constitutional and human rights. The injustices done to the Turks for the following eleven years or so were myriad. Many of them either abandoned their homes and properties, or were driven out of them, and had to take refuge in the refugee camps in the Turkish enclave of Nicosia. There were some twenty-four thousand of them. Their plight and cries of anguish went unheeded. When some of them from Ormorphita, a suburb of Nicosia, wanted to take the risk of going back to their looted homes the response from the Greek side transmitted through the local Greek Press was historic, "what is taken after bloodshed is not given back." Ironically, the blood in question was that of the defenceless Turkish Cypriot residents of Ormorphita. It was to remain a ghost town for eleven years until liberated by the Turkish Peace Force in August, 1974.
Besides physical and political persecution the Turks also suffered economic persecution. For example, near Kyrenia the Greeks grabbed the commercial fruit and vegetable garden of a Turkish peasant and cut down the trees to set up a military barrack there, turning it into a parched and barren land. In contrast the Greek-owned gardens around remained green and untouched. The Turkish owner got not a penny of compensation. Again, when the new Kyrenia-Nicosia road was being built, parts of the fields through which the road passed were unceremoniously confiscated. The Turkish peasants who lost chunks of their fields and livelihoods in this way got no compensation at all, while their Greek counterparts were promptly and fully compensated. It was useless for the Turks to protest, as they could get no redress.
In his own country the Turkish Cypriot was less than a foreigner: the Turk had far fewer rights, like those of life, limb, property. It was the active national policy of the Makarios's Administration to deprive Turks of their lands by any means, fair or foul. It is an indication of the Greek sense of justice and compatriotship that some unscrupulous foreigners were even encouraged to (harass Turkish villagers living in Greek-held areas in order to buy off their lands. Any foreigner who succeeded in that would win immediate favour with the Makarios regime. The Turks, who have always been largely an agricultural Community living off the land, have traditionally owned a high proportion of land in Cyprus, and this was a sty in the eye for the Greeks claiming Cyprus to be Greek. Any Greek who wanted to sell his land or house to a Turk would incur the wrath of the Greek Authorities. Such a transaction would not be sanctioned by the Greek-run Land Registration Department, which would refuse to issue a deed of title, an odd behaviour indeed by those proclaiming to be the Government of Cyprus.
All these happened during the regime of Archbishop Makarios. Many Turks who could not stand the conditions of life sold up what little they had, at what little price they could get, and emigrated. To the Greek Administration, this was, after all, the point of the exercise.[/quote]
Kifeas
How do you put all the land mentioned here into your equation. I will hazard a guess and say you will dismiss it and say it is just propaganda.
Well let me take an example of the text above and quote to you the cold harsh truthes that the TCs of the time were given by the GCs.
Greek side transmitted through the local Greek Press was historic, "what is taken after bloodshed is not given back
