President Ersin Tatar addressed the 16km ‘Resistance Race’ awards ceremony that was held at the Turkish Resistance Organisation Mujahadeen Association in Lefkoşa, in commemoration of August 1, Social Resistance Day, that marks three important anniversaries for the Turkish Cypriot People.

Addressing the ceremony, President Tatar commemorated the 47th anniversary of the establishment of the Security Forces Command (GKK), the 65th anniversary of the establishment of the Turkish Resistance Organisation (TMT) and the 452nd anniversary of the Ottoman conquest of Cyprus.
 
“We are marking three very important anniversaries for the Turkish Cypriot People,” President Tatar said during his address at the ceremony. “The island of Cyprus was conquered in 1571 by the Ottomans where 80,000 martyrs sacrificed their lives,” adding that “despite the island being our homeland for centuries, the Turkish Cypriots were victimised following the British lease of the island in 1878 and lived with the belief that Turkish forces would one day return to the island”.

President Tatar said that “the Turkish Cypriot People defended their inherent rights on the island at the cost of many sacrifices and put forward an epic struggle against the aspiration of the Greek-Greek Cypriot duo of uniting Cyprus with Greece (ENOSIS), which was declared to the world”.

The President stated that during the period of when the Turkish Resistance Organisation had been formed, Adnan Menderes, the President of Türkiye at the time, Minister of Foreign Affairs Fatin Rüştü Zorlu, Founding President Rauf Raif Denktaş and the leader of the Turkish Cypriot Struggle for Existence and Freedom Dr. Fazıl Küçük had “put forward great efforts to defend the rights of the Turkish Cypriot People and to prevent ENOSIS. Today, we remember all of them with gratitude and respect,” he said.

Noting that there have been “several acts” played out to turn Cyprus into a Hellenic Island, the President said: “British archives contain important documents about the ENOSIS aspiration of the Greek-Greek Cypriot duo. Britain had at one stage in the 1950s been persuaded to depart from the island, retain two Sovereign Base Areas, and allow for ENOSIS.  They purposefully increased the [non-Turkish] population of the island to be increased from 100,000 to about 400,000. All of these are documented in British archives.”

President Tatar stated that Turkish Cypriots were expulsed from the state apparatus of the partnership republic by force of arms in 1963, and for 11 years there were island-wide attacks against them by the Greek-Greek Cypriot duo and the EOKA terrorist organisation. He said in July 1974, these attacks culminated with the coup d’état by the Greek Junta and that the ‘Hellenic Republic of Cyprus’ was declared. “It was on July 20, 1974, that Motherland and Guarantor Türkiye undertook the Cyprus Peace Operation in accordance with the obligations enshrined in international treaties and brought peace to our island,” President Tatar said.

He said a realistic, viable and sustainable settlement can be reached through the acknowledgment and reaffirmation of the sovereign equality and equal international status of the Turkish Cypriot Side, on the basis of two sovereign States in Cyprus.  “This was the message I conveyed to the Greek Cypriot leader during our visit to the anthropological laboratory of the Committee on Missing Persons on July 28,” President Tatar said, adding that “the Republic of Türkiye is in full support of my new policy”.

The President said that negotiations on the federal basis have been exhausted, and that the time has come to think outside the federal box in a sincere and constructive way.

President Tatar also said that there were tangible results from the two States policy and referred to the historical call made by the President of the Republic of Türkiye, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at the 77th session of the UN General Assembly in New York last September, where he invited the international community to formally recognise the TRNC. He also stated that the TRNC has been accepted as an observer member of the Organisation of Turkic States. “All of these demonstrate that there are two separate States, two democracies and two Peoples on the island of Cyprus,” President Tatar said.

President Tatar congratulated all the competitors who participated in the 16km race and handed out the trophies and medals to the winners and runners-up.