| 1974 Cypriot coup d'état | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of theCyprus problem | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
Pro-government militias |
 Greek junta | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
 Makarios IIIVassos Lyssarides Pantelakis Pantatzis |  Brigadier General Michalis GeorgitsisColonel Konstantinos Kombokis[1] Athanasios SklavenitisNikos Sampson | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| 1,617 Cypriots missing, 300 civilians among them killed[2] | Andreas Kestas – 20 years old, member of the Special Reserve Force, from Limassol. Haralambos Kirillou – 19 years old, member of the Special Reserve Force, from Chloraka. Nikos Solomou – 21 years old, member of the Special Reserve Force, from Pachyammos. Philipos Kritiotis – 20 years old, National Guard, from Stato-Agios Fotios. | ||||||
The1974 Cypriot coup d'état was a militarycoup d'état executed by theCypriot National Guard and sponsored by theGreek military junta. On 15 July 1974 the coup plotters removed the sitting President of Cyprus, ArchbishopMakarios III, from office and installed pro-Enosis nationalistNikos Sampson.[3][4][5] The Sampson regime was described as apuppet state, whose ultimate aim was the annexation of the island by Greece;[6][7][8] in the short term, the coupists proclaimed the establishment of the "Hellenic Republic of Cyprus".[9][10] The coup was viewed as illegal by theUnited Nations and led immediately to theTurkish invasion andongoing occupation of Cyprus.
TheRepublic of Cyprus was established in 1960 with theLondon and Zurich Agreements, and theGreek Cypriots andTurkish Cypriots were the two founding communities. However, following constitutionalamendments that were proposed by Makarios III and rejected by Turkish Cypriots,[11]intercommunal violence erupted throughout the island, the Turkish Cypriot representation in the government ended partially due to forced prevention and partially due to willing withdrawal, and Turkish Cypriots started living inenclaves.[12]
Greece had established a national policy ofenosis to achieve the island's union with Greece since the 1950s.[13] After 1964, the Greek government tried to control Makarios' policies, and following his unwillingness to obey Athens, attempted to destabilize his government. While the Greek policy shifted to a more cooperative one after 1967, when an extremist military juntatook power in Greece, it supported the far-rightEOKA-B group against Makarios.[14]Dimitrios Ioannidis, thede facto leader of the junta, believed that Makarios was no longer a true supporter of enosis, and suspected him of being a communist sympathizer.[4] Between 1971 and 1974, five plans were prepared by the Greek government to overthrow Makarios' government.[15]
The coup was ordered by Dimitrios Ioannidis, the shadow leader of the Greek junta, and Greek officers led the Cypriot National Guard to capture thePresidential Palace in Nicosia.[16] The building was almost entirely burned down.[17] Makarios narrowly escaped death in the attack owing to the efforts of his presidential guard, Haralambos Kirillou a then 19 years old, member of the Special Reserve Force, from Chloraka and Nikos Solomou, a 21 years old, member of the Special Reserve Force, from Pachyammos who took part in an operation to rescue Makarios on 15 July 1974. Owing to this operation, he fled the presidential palace from its back door and went toPaphos, where the British managed to retrieve him in the afternoon of 16 July and flew him fromAkrotiri toMalta in aRoyal Air Force transport plane, and from there to London the next morning.[4][18][3] On 19 July, he attended aUnited Nations Security Council meeting in New York and gave a speech, in which he stated that Cyprus had been invaded by Greece.[19]
The newly established regime has been described as an extremistpuppet regime of the Greek junta.[20][21][22] On 15 July, between 8 am and 9 am, the coup leaders proclaimed their victory on the state channelCyprus Broadcasting Corporation, saying "The national guard intervened in order to solve the problematical situation. [...]. Makarios is dead." However, before his flight, Makarios announced that he was alive from a private broadcast in Paphos. The new government heavily censored the press and stopped left-wing newspapers being printed. Only right-wing newspapersMachi,Ethniki andAgon continued publishing, and their style was very propagandistic. Sampson did not openly announce his intention ofenosis in the days following the coup, but instead focused on suppressing any support for Makarios and heavy propaganda to vilify his government.[23]
In response,Rauf Denktaş, the leader of the Turkish Cypriots, stated that he believed that the events were among Greek Cypriots and called for Turkish Cypriots not to go out, as well as forUNFICYP to take extensive security measures for Turkish Cypriots.[24] The Cypriot National Guard made no attempts to enter theTurkish Cypriot enclaves, but raided Greek and Turkish Cypriot homes alike in mixed villages to confiscate weapons. The Turkish government brought claims that ammunition was being carried to Cyprus byOlympic Air to the attention of UNFICYP.[25] Whether the Turkish Cypriots suffered as a direct result of the coup remains controversial, but Sampson was seen as an untrustworthy figure due to his pro-enosis policies and brutal role against Turkish Cypriots in 1963.[16]
Following the coup, the newly established junta started a crackdown on Makarios supporters, resulting in a number of deaths and a "significant number", according to Frank Hoffmeister, being detained. The number of deaths from the coup remains a disputed issue,[16] as the Republic of Cyprus lists the deaths due to the coup among the missing due to the Turkish invasion. According to Haralambos Athanasopulos, at least 500 Greek Cypriots have been placed on the list of 1617 Greek Cypriot missing people and their deaths blamed on the Turks and Turkish Cypriots.[2] According toMilliyet on 19 July 1974, violent clashes had broken out inPaphos, and even excluding Paphos, the death toll due to Greek Cypriot infighting was about 300 civilians and 30 Greek soldiers, whose bodies were brought to Athens.[25]
In response to the coup, on 20 July 1974Turkeyinvaded the island saying that the action was compliant with the1960 Treaty of Guarantee,[26][27] taking control of the north and dividing Cyprus along what became known as theGreen Line, cutting off about a third of the total territory. Sampson resigned, the military regime that had appointed him collapsed, and Makarios returned. The Turkish Cypriots established an independent government for what they called theTurkish Federated State of Cyprus (TFSC), withRauf Denktaş as president. In 1983 they would proclaim theTurkish Republic of Northern Cyprus on the northern part of the island, which remains ade facto state.[28]
[...] culminating in the 1974 coup aimed at the annexation of Cyprus to Greece
From early 1950s onward Greece has favored union with Cyprus through a policy of enosis
The process reached a critical threshold in 1974 when a botched nationalist coup instigated by the Greek junta against the Cypriot government was used as a pretext by Turkey to invade and occupy the northern part of the island. Greece and ...
