According to signs around the Nicosia stadium in the south, displayed during the APOEL v Chelsea match tonight, some Greek Cypriots seem to believe that the country is owned by Greece. It’s a bit like saying that England belongs to the Italians because a few thousand years ago the Romans did manage to conquer us. I’m not sure why the Greek Cypriot authorities have allowed these signs to be displayed so prominently around the pitch but I’m sure they are going to be fined a similar sum to the $2.5m Turkey had to pay for allowing the TRNC President to present a cup to the winner of the Formula 1 race there. Watch this space.
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North Cyprus Free Press 
Hi Dominic
I found this image of the banner on the internet
Hyam
I have now sent an email to UEFA at info@uefa.com complaining about the racism at the match, perhaps you would like to also send your comments to them and anywhere else the match is being discussed. A link back the the article here might show people exactly what is being talked about.
Hi
Our online newspaper is running a story about the blatant racist banners shown during SkySport’s airing of the APOEL v Chelsea match. In our eyes, the ‘Cyprus is Greek’ banners shown during the APOEL v Chelsea match are harking back to the events leading up to the 1974 attempted coup by the Greeks in Cyprus and to ALLOW these banners to be displayed shows elements in the Greek Cypriot government who want to provoke a violent reaction from Turkish Cypriots and from Turkey. It is a racist statement which infers that Turkish Cypriots are foreigners in Cyprus and to widely distribute the message around the world could cause a backlash. In the light of the $2.5m fine imposed on Turkey for allowing TRNC’s President Talat to present a cup to the Formula 1 winners, I feel that a similar fine should be meted out to the Greek Cypriot government who seem to be condoning this display of racism during the sensitive unification negotiations now taking place in Cyprus.
Do I feel a petition coming on?
Now, let’s see, I organised a “stop dog poisoning” petition once. I can’t remember, but did that stop dog poisoning? The way forward on this is to point out to UEFA that racism was being allowed and they should punish it. Individual reactions are needed not a wad of paper which’ll probably end up in a bin. Petitions are an excellent start to a protest but that’s all… Email UEFA
Your petition about dog poisoning was well intentioned but aimed at people who could care less and wouldn’t deign to condemn the indefensable. However, if a petition is to be started here it needs a vehicle to direct it to people relevant to this issue, i.e FIFA, the EU, etc. I have e-mailed the editor of the Cyprus Mail to see the reaction we get. This has to be brought to the attention of as people as possible by as many people as possible.
Hi Malcolm,
Just to point out to your readers that it will be worth raising the issue with organisations such as Kick It Out [KIO] and Show Racism the Red Card. I know these groups are both based in the UK, though Piara Power, who is top cheese at KIO is also a director at FARE, which is Football Against Racism in Europe. I know both of these groups personally and I will be raising the issue with them too.
Best,
Fevzi
Oy, you guys I just like to inform you about some stuff. Don’t get me wrong, i am cypriot and i am strongly opposed to Greek – Turkish separation of Cyprus and i support by all means the reunification of the island etc. But there some things you need to know.
1) UEFA cut a major fee on APOEL for the game with chelsea not only for the banner but also for other stuff like the an insult of a woman by Apoel Hardcore fans and because GSP stadium was overloaded.
2) A.P.O.E.L was founded 1926 and its name is a short cut that means “Athletic Football Club of Greeks of Nicosia” So by definition its a right wing football club. But i would like to say that nowdays the majority of APoel funs are NOT hard core. The banners are from some small majority of overexcited teenagers.
3) Yeah i know its crap, but really i cannot see why the Official Cyprus government is responsible for the oral behaviour of some kids or adults, and REALLY i cannot see how a democratic government can restrict or ban a football club banner or right wing ideologies, There is a human right called: Freedom of speech. Even Right wings parties are allowed to express freely in a democracy unless if they publicly raise hate against a protected minority, (then they become illegal) and thats a fact in all European countries. That is the major deference between a democracy and a regime, In a regime opinions against the domain ideology are not allowed.
4) i don’t think a banner saying Cyprus is Greek means Turkish Cypriots and all other ethnicities should be kicked out of cyprus that is plain stupidity. The banner its just a not well thought reaction to the shitty political situation in the island that will expire the day after the island is re-united and all human rights are restored. Don’t forget that even now as we talk Turkey reserves 50 thousand army troops on the island and 200.000 Greek cypriots were forced out of their houses back in 1974 and till today they are not allowed to move back in and not only that Turkey keeps bringing Turkish settlers in North Cyprus baptize them as Turkish-Cypriots with european citizens privileges witch is an absurd war Crime people. If you wanna speak about racism speak about that: Turkish cypriots are allowed to come to South cyprus and habit – vote – work- sell- buy property- enjoy free health care system – etc but GC are not allowed to move to North cyprus were they used to stay for thousands of years because they are NOT turkish. THIS IS FUCKING RACISM. So no wander some Greek Cypriot are pissed with all this shitty situation Cyprus is Greek just means that Greek cypriots hold their legitimate right to own properties in the entire island (witch is by the way European ground so all european citizens not only Greek Cypriot should hold the right to own property there)
As you say, freedom of speech is a human right but at the same time so is the right to not be subjected to language that is offensive. In many pubs people are warned that if they swear they will not be allowed in them and police are warning that swearing can be anti-social behaviour (see http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/kent/4734350.stm) This is a polite way of saying that you have made some good points but as this is a public board I would appreciate it if you wouldn’t swear, especially as this adds nothing to your argument and only makes you appear aggressive. As you can see I have not censored your language but I would appreciate if you did. – (the editor)
Sorry mate, i got carried away..
..i would like to add an additional info that might be interesting.
We racist Greek Cyprus publish ALL of our public documents in Turkish language so that the Turkish cypriots can’t read it The former currency before we adopt euro (lira) also used to write Turkish on it (bir lira) The logo of racist republic of Greek cypriots (the pigeon with the olive branch) that is being used until today was designed by a turkish cypriot. Even the Cyprus flag it self that many GC shared there tears on it is designed by a Turkish Cypriot. Cyprus flag that we hold as a symbol of our independence is a living proof that Gc consider Turkish Cypriots as equal owners of this free Land. But TC all they talk about is partition partition partition and enslave their selves to mother turkey because of propaganda that says Turkey is there to protect their turkishness. (Hey what about protecting your Cyprusness?)
As far as i know only racist regimes practice this kind of ethnic cleansing policies.
They just do not respect our right to co-own North cyprus,. Really i cannot believe that we came to a point even discussing this things, the perpetrator officially became the victim. I mean.. Imagine one day if a crazy British guy with a gun and a brain full of crazy-ideologies comes to your house in North london and kicks you out of it with the excuse that this land belongs to Arsenalbritish people’s Republic of North london because he says so. And then he comes accusing you as a racist because you want to pollute his holy ground with your present.
Thats how crazy this is for us.
I don’t wanna sound self indulgent but consider that Cypriots are one of the most educated people in the Eu.
1at3 GreekCypriots own a higher education degree. If you think that easily that we are Racist You might as well accuse swiss people as racist. (I mean why not? They wan’t to habit all switzerland without RACE criteria!) Sure i admit there are some Racist pricks here and there but you cannot put all of us in the same basked. And all those who are now considered racist the day after their human rights are restored throw reunification they will be eliminated in a blink of an eye.
Trust me on that.
Peace.
i mean through reunification.. 🙂
I’m pleased to note that Cypriots such as yourself are in existence and that their views are compatible with the Cypriot spirit. I agree entirely with your sentiments , I would only add that an ever increasing number of T/Cs both in Cyprus and the diaspora , share your views and mine in that we are all first and foremost Cypriots and that our island is one of the many common grounds that we share, in fact take religion and language out as well as Greece and Turkey and you can hardly tell the difference .
Empathy is an emotion that is a prerequisite in order to understand the feelings of the other side , just as we need to understand the concerns of the T/Cs they too must understand ours.
I’m on record , on having stated on the CY forum that my ambition is to see a T/C as the president of a united Cyprus , a president that would have the interests of Cyprus as his /her primary objective , a president whose election was made possible by a pancyprian party embracing all Cypriots , just like a Scot can be a PM of Britain , or indeed a Welshman , Englishman etc.
Just to clarify a few things my friends:
1) There is no such thing in the world as TRNC (unless you are Turkish or Turkish Cypriot) – ie around 80 million people worldwide against the 6.7 billion population believe that such a ”territory” exists.
2) In order to address this incident, a serious protestor/demonstrator must firtly accuse the Cypriot Football Organisation (CFA) and NOT the Cypriot Government. The Cypriot government (which is predominantly Left Wing and anti-nationalist and anti-racist) now struggles to eliminate such extreme nationalist incidents and is not in favour of these banners whatsoever.
3) The same football ”fans” have repeatedly chanted against the Cypriot Government since it was elected in February 2008.
4) So the CFA should be firstly accused for allowing this banner to be displayed in a CL game (to add a bit of enlightment to all of you – the CFA president is an APOEL fan and APOEL has been favoured several times in the past due to decisions taken by the CFA governance).
You really want the Cypriot government to pay $2.5m for the banners? The Cypriot government that takes money only from the Greek Cypriots tax payers and with that money provides :
– free health care to every Turkish Cypriot
– free electricity to the Turkish Cypriot for the last 35 years
– the same economic support and benefits to every Turkish Cypriot as any Greek Cypriot has
, even though no Turkish Cypriot pays taxes?
And there is no comparison with the time when Talat presented the 2006 Turkish GP winner award. Every Formula 1 GP race organizer must act on behalf of the FIA on every aspect of the event. The FIA does not recognize trnc as a individual country so referring to Talat as “the president of trnc” by the Turkish GP organizers violated the FIA rules. It was clearly the organizes (the Turkish government) who made the mistake.
In the case of APOEL you can not blame a government for a banner in a football match! Just imagine how much money the Greek and the Turkish government would have to pay all these years every time PAO, Olympiakos and AEK played with Fener, Galata and Besiktas.
The thing that annoys me about your way of thinking is that you act like you care much about the “sensitive unification negotiations” but you keep calling the Cyprus government (yes the one that as i mentioned before provides everything for you for free) as “the Greek Cypriot Government”. You act like you are so against racism but your whole point is to make the Greek Cypriots look like bad people and that is … racist!
The Greek Cypriots spend approximately 50 times more money to get in the European Union so that all the citizens of the Cyprus Government can have all the benefits and wrights any European citizen has. Even though the Turkish Cypriots never contributed (not a penny) for this effort, no Greek Cypriot complained about that….not even with a banner on this matter!
My friend you cannot fool anyone! If you want to fight racism stop in Cyprus stop finding stupid reasons to blame all Greek Cypriots! If you concern about the peace talks in the island, stop being so ungrateful by asking the people that already spent so much money to your community to spend $2.5m for a football banner! And if you want the Greeks and the Turks to get along stop being such a bad example….even to the Cyprus Donkey!
Just a correction. In the second to last paragraph, a meant to say is 50 times more money than the amount you ask to pay for the banner ($2.5m).
– “free electricity to the Turkish Cypriot for the last 35 years”? That’s news to us. You very kindly helped us out a few years ago when our power station blew up, but I think the electricity was sold to us – not given.
My friend, for the last 35 the Dhekelia power plant covers a big part of your electric power needs! I even remember back in 1997 when the Dhekelia power plant had 3 black-outs in one week, Raouf Denktas said that we were doing it on purpose and that the next time he would take military measures.
As for if you paid the electricity or if it was free, a can assure you that it was free! Just check any Greek Cypriot newspaper about this matters all these years. And the only thing the Greek Cypriots ever complaint about this was when put lights on Pentadaktilos.
Hello Malcolm and Dominica,
Even though i totally agree with you that banners such as the one apoel fans brought to the game should be restricted and not allowed to football games, officially inviting the so called “president” of a “country” only recognized by Turkey to a formula 1 game is not the same thing. (Cyprus is Cypriot..the terms Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots was invented by the British back in 1959 as part of their divide and conquer strategy that ruined the island..before that there were only orthodox Cypriots and muslim Cypriots and noone had a problem with it). In addition how can you blame the Cypriot Government for a banner? If you decide to take a banner saying “all Americans suck” in a Man Utd- Liverpool game should the British Government be blamed? Yes i agree, punish apoel, but do it for the right reasons and with the right intentions.
Excuse me for saying this, but even though i agree with you that the banner is not true, and should never be allowed in a football game i do not think your intentions are pure, but have the purpose of accusing the Greek Cypriot side only. You are no better than those who brought the banner, since you repeatedly mention the northern part of Cyprus as “TRNC” while THERE IS ONLY ONE CYPRUS and trust me it’s big enough to fit Greek Cypriots, Turkish Cypriots, Armenian Cypriots and Latino Cypriots. Let it be noted that the majority of Greek Cypriots do not think like those few apoel fans. The majority of Greek Cypriots believe we are capable of finding a righteous solution and live peacefully. Unfortunately ethicists on both sides make it harder, but we will not give up.
The articles mentioning TRNC were, I believe, part of Fevzi’s Embargoed! articles. I put the banner in the category of a “Britain is English” banner at a Scotland v England match, in other words there to be provocative. I have no problem with the idea that people go around with banners but what I do take issue with is the way that the banners in Nicosia ( a few 100 meters from the Green Line) seemed to be condoned by the authorities there. I do not see the government in the south as being too weak to act against this incident IF THEY WANTED TO and so I blame them for their silence. Your “Cyprus is Cypriot” statement smacks of “Britain is British” (inferring that non-whites should go home) but then I might be reading into your intentions and they have nothing with attitudes which talk about “Turks going home.” Of course everyone is to blame apart from the electorate in Cyprus, it’s a cop out used around the world when ex-colonies fail to go it alone.
As for accusing one side only, read the newspaper.