Nicosia, Cyprus — The clang of invisible assault rifles being cocked is heard throughout the United Nations-controlled buffer zone in ethnically divided areas. Cyprusraising concerns that the embers of the island’s stagnant conflict could flare up again.
The rifles are just the tip of a series of recent escalations by Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots, rivals separated along the 180-kilometer (120-mile) buffer zone that snakes through the capital’s medieval center.
The United Nations peacekeeping force in Cyprus, known as UNFICYP, has seen the deployment of large-caliber weapons at guard posts, such as machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades, the construction of hundreds of new fighting positions, as well as the installing dozens of high-tech cameras with infrared capability that could potentially assist with artillery and missile targeting systems, said the force’s outgoing military chief of staff, Col. Ben Ramsay.
Such actions are considered to violate the buffer zone and have occurred with increasing frequency.
“No one is listening,” Colonel Ramsay told the Associated Press during a tour of the abandoned homes and businesses of the inaccessible buffer zone, left to the ravages of time. “A miscalculation is a matter of time.”
The buffer zone connecting the north and south (more than 6 kilometers (4 miles) at its widest, a few meters (yards) at its narrowest) serves as a reminder of the island nation’s tortured politics. which culminated in a Turkish invasion in 1974, in response to a coup d’état. by supporters of union with Greece. UN peacekeepers had been deployed to Cyprus to quell fighting between the two communities a decade before the invasion, and after the invasion their mandate was expanded to patrol the buffer zone.
The two sides eased their military preparedness after a 1989 agreement between separatist Turkish Cypriots in the northern third of the island and Greek Cypriots in the south, in which they agreed to withdraw their forces.
Now, on the eve of the 50th anniversary of a war that left Cyprus the only remaining divided member of the European Union, Rising tensions are something the international community cannot afford. – particularly on an island from which thousands of tons of humanitarian aid have been sent. sent to war-torn Gaza.
So far in 2024, there has been a 70% increase in breaches in the buffer zone compared to a year ago, Colonel Ramsay said, mainly due to construction by both sides within the neutral territory. In 2023, there was a 60% increase in these types of violations.
The summer months see the highest number of violations in what Colonel Ramsay calls a “silent battlefield” where “a game of chess is being played.”
Only 800 military personnel are assigned to patrol the entire buffer zone, which Colonel Ramsay acknowledged poses a challenge. But the UN has its own high-tech surveillance cameras to monitor any unauthorized incursions into the buffer zone and quickly dispatch peacekeepers to potential trouble spots before things get out of control, with the help of a artificial intelligence called Python Scripts that can predict when and where buffer zone invasions might take place. They also reopened a command post within the Nicosia buffer zone from where peacekeepers can monitor any activity 24 hours a day.
In 2023, Turkish Cypriots attacked UN peacekeepers after they stood in the way of work crews building a road that would have encroached on the buffer zone.
Turkish Cypriots have challenged UNFICYP’s authority inside the buffer zone to try to pressure the world body to recognize the statehood they unilaterally declared in 1983. Only Turkey recognizes the breakaway state and maintains more than 35,000 troops there.
The island’s Greek Cypriot president, Nikos Christodoulides, blamed buffer zone violations squarely on Turkey and Turkish Cypriots, although the UN says high-tech surveillance equipment his government recently installed along the buffer zone Damping also qualifies as a violation. Cypriot government officials say the cameras were installed to monitor and prevent possible crossings of asylum seekers to the south.
Türkiye and the Turkish Cypriots have strongly insisted on a two-state agreement that the Greek Cypriots have dismissed as impossible. The two sides have not engaged in any real dialogue for a peace deal in seven years, since the last major effort to reunify the island as a federated republic made up of Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot areas failed.
The last attempt by the personal envoy of the UN chief, María Ángela Holguín Cuéllar, to bring both parties back to the negotiating table seems to be failing.
The head of the UN mission in Cyprus, Colin Stewart, warned in early July that if attempts at peace talks were halted, there would be “consequences in the buffer zone”.
It is a concern shared by Turkish Cypriot Ipek Borman and Greek Cypriot Anna Koukkides-Procopiou, members of the steering committee of the newly founded Cyprus Bicommunal Women’s Coalition, a group dedicated to the equal participation of women in the island’s peace process. .
In June, Hezbollah warned Cyprus not allow the Israeli army to use its airports on the island to bomb Lebanon. Borman and Koukkides-Procopiou point to the threat as an example of why the division of Cyprus can no longer be seen as a conflict marginalized and isolated from the events unfolding in a tumultuous region.
Getting both sides back into talks is key to preventing tensions on the island from escalating to a point where open hostilities could break out again.
“Cyprus is part of a regional security puzzle and does the world need another conflict? Does the world need another wildfire? Koukkides-Procopiou told the Associated Press. Without a return to talks, “unfortunately, we could encounter an escalation of tensions that would be too late to control.”
This story originally appeared on ABCNews.go.com read the full story
