The United Nations Force deployed in Cyprus to maintain peace on the island (UNFIKIP) has decided to increase patrols along the Green Line – the island’s buffer zone – following a series of incidents, UNFIKIP said on its Twitter page.
The reason for the decision was the frequent attempts of the Turkish military in recent days to persecute Greek farmers working on farms in the neutral zone of the island controlled by the World Organization.
On October 25, Turkish soldiers forced a villager to leave the green line near the village of Denia. UN peacekeepers did not prevent them. At the same time, UN peacekeepers prevented a similar attempt by the Turkish military near the village of Astromeritis and came to the farmer’s defense.
Cyprus has been divided in two since 1974, when the Turkish army invaded the north of the island in response to a coup d’état aimed at annexing the Mediterranean island to Greece.
In 1983, the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus was proclaimed in the northern part of the island, which still remains unrecognized by the international community, except for Turkey.
#UNFICYP peacekeepers on patrol inside the #UN buffer zone. We are stepping up our patrols across hotspots to prevent tensions and keep the peace #ServingForPeace #A4P pic.twitter.com/KJB0oS43Wb
— UN Cyprus (@UN_CYPRUS) November 2, 2022
Last year, the Republic of Cyprus signed an agreement on the creation of an Israeli surveillance system on the “green line”, which divided the island into two parts after the Turkish invasion in 1974, BTA reminds.