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Portal:Cyprus

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The flag of Cyprus

Cyprus (/ˈsprəs/ ), officially the Republic of Cyprus, is an island country in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Situated in West Asia, its cultural identity and geopolitical orientation are overwhelmingly Southeast European. Cyprus is the third largest and third most populous island in the Mediterranean, after Sicily and Sardinia. It is located southeast of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and Lebanon, northwest of Israel, and north of Egypt. Its capital and largest city is Nicosia. Cyprus hosts the British military bases Akrotiri and Dhekelia, whilst the northeast portion of the island is de facto governed by the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, which is separated from the Republic of Cyprus by the United Nations Buffer Zone.

Cyprus was first settled by hunter-gatherers around 13,000 years ago, with farming communities emerging by 8500 BC. The late Bronze Age saw the emergence of Alashiya, an urbanised society closely connected to the wider Mediterranean world. Cyprus experienced waves of settlement by Mycenaean Greeks at the end of the 2nd millennium BC. Owing to its rich natural resources (particularly copper) and strategic position at the crossroads of Europe, Africa, and Asia, the island was subsequently contested and occupied by several empires, including the Assyrians, Egyptians, and Persians, from whom it was seized in 333 BC by Alexander the Great. Successive rule by Ptolemaic Egypt, the Classical and Eastern Roman Empire, Arab caliphates, the French Lusignans, and the Venetians was followed by over three centuries of Ottoman dominion (1571–1878). Cyprus was placed under British administration in 1878 pursuant to the Cyprus Convention and formally annexed by the United Kingdom in 1914.

The island's future became a matter of disagreement between its Greek and Turkish communities. Greek Cypriots sought enosis, or union with Greece, which became a Greek national policy in the 1950s. Turkish Cypriots initially advocated for continued British rule, then demanded the annexation of the island to Turkey, with which they established the policy of taksim: portioning Cyprus and creating a Turkish polity in the north of the island. Following nationalist violence in the 1950s, Cyprus was granted independence in 1960. The crisis of 1963–64 brought further intercommunal violence between the two communities, displaced more than 25,000 Turkish Cypriots into enclaves, and ended Turkish Cypriot political representation. On 15 July 1974, a coup d'état was staged by Greek Cypriot nationalists and elements of the Greek military junta. This action precipitated the Turkish invasion of Cyprus on 20 July, which captured the present-day territory of Northern Cyprus and displaced over 150,000 Greek Cypriots and 50,000 Turkish Cypriots. A separate Turkish Cypriot state in the north was established by unilateral declaration in 1983, which was widely condemned by the international community and remains recognised only by Turkey. These events and the resulting political situation remain subject to an ongoing dispute. (Full article...)

A Cypriot demonstration in the 1930s in favour of enosis

Enosis (Greek: Ένωσις, IPA: [ˈenosis], "union") is an irredentist ideology held by various Greek communities living outside Greece that calls for them and the regions that they inhabit to be incorporated into the Greek state. The idea is related to the Megali Idea, a concept of a Greek state that dominated Greek politics following the creation of modern Greece in 1830. The Megali Idea called for the establishment of a larger Greek state including the lands outside Greece that remained under foreign rule following the Greek War of Independence in the 1820s, but which nevertheless still had large Greek populations.

The most widely known example of enosis is the movement within Greek Cypriots for a union of Cyprus with Greece. The idea of enosis in British-ruled Cyprus became associated with the campaign for Cypriot self-determination, especially among the island's Greek Cypriot majority. However, many Turkish Cypriots opposed enosis without taksim, the partitioning of the island between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots. In 1960, the Republic of Cyprus was born, resulting in neither enosis nor taksim. (Full article...)

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Cyprus news

23 July 2025 – 2025 European and Mediterranean wildfires
Two people are killed and hundreds of others are evacuated in a fire in Limassol, Cyprus. The fire brigade chief says the fire was arson. (Greek Reporter) (Cyprus Mail)
24 May 2025 – 2024–25 Cypriot Cup
In association football, AEK Larnaca win the Cypriot Cup after defeating Pafos FC on penalties 5–4 after a 0–0 draw at the GSP Stadium in Nicosia. (Cyprus News Agency)

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