TR

Fourteen martyrs of 1974 laid to rest

Fourteen Turkish Cypriot school children, who were killed by Greek Cypriot forces in 1974, were laid to rest following a military ceremony that was attended by President Ersin Tatar.

The children, aged between four months and fifteen years of age, had been made martyrs following an attack by EOKA-B terrorists on August 14, 1974.   The ceremony was held at the Muratağa Martyrs’ Cemetery on Saturday after separate funeral prayers were held behind the caskets which were draped in Turkish and TRNC flags.


The schoolchildren were aged between four months and 15 years of whom seven are females and  seven are males. Their remains had been exhumed from the mass grave by the Committee on Missing Persons in Cyprus in 2016, which had carried out DNA testing to determine their identities.  A total of 126 Turkish Cypriot villagers had been killed when the villages of Muratağa, Atlılar and Sandallar, of the Gazimağusa district, were attacked.