Sevgul Uludag
caramel_cy@yahoo.com
Tel: 00 357 99 966518
00 90 542 853 8436
Together with the Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot officials of the Cyprus Missing Persons' Committee, Murat Soysal, Okan Oktay and Xenophon Kallis, we go once again to Komurdju near Aghirdagh to meet one of my readers…
With his help next to this stream we had found the remains of five `missing` Greek Cypriots a few years ago – he had shown us the possible place of a well where a `missing` Greek Cypriot from 1964 was said to be buried. This well has not been excavated yet…
The `missing` Greek Cypriot from 1964 was from Karmi – he had been kidnapped from his fields with his donkey and taken to Aghirdagh… In those times there was tension between a Turkish Cypriot from Aghirdagh and a Greek Cypriot from Karmi – the Turkish Cypriot would graze his animals in the fields of Aristoteles Hadjicosta and this would create tension…
Aristoteles Hadjicosta had gone `missing` on the 13th of January 1964 and a week after he had gone `missing` from around Agios Ilarion, his donkey and his dog would come back home without him…
I had gone to interview the 98 year old sister of Aristoteles, Ephtalia who kept his photograph and waited for any news from him…
Today we are once again in the area of Komurdju next to Aghirdagh and my reader has more to tell me on the `missing` Aristoteles…
`They spoke of another small well around the stream` he says and he shows us yet another possible burial site in this area…
`I heard them speak of him in the coffee shop – that he was buried in the well around here` he says…
Kallis as always investigates the whole area and finds something that looks like a well…
We take photos and coordinates of the possible burial site and thank my reader for his help again and say goodbye to him to go to Yerolakko where another reader is waiting with some witnesses about another possible burial site…
We meet in Yerolakko with my other Turkish Cypriot reader and he introduces us to two elderly Turkish Cypriot women who had been settled after 1974 from their village in the southern part of our island to Yerolakko.
The house is next to the football stadium of Yerolakko and it is at the end of the village…
When they moved to this house as refugees, they had noticed that there was a freshly dug area with heaps of soil that looked very suspicious to them. They show us the area where there might be a possible burial site.
Next to this house was a Greek Cypriot military post they remember and they had heard that in one house across this house there had also been some Greek Cypriot soldiers.
The house is not far from a `factory` they say – according to their description, this `factory` as they call it or maybe a big supermarket had a lot of pots and pans and plates and forks and everything that a refugee might need having moved with nothing but only with the clothes on them… All the refugees settled in Yerolakko would go to this `factory` in the village to get stuff that they urgently needed…
We thank our reader and the two elderly ladies for sharing all they know and say goodbye to them…
Soon after the Cyprus Missing Persons' Committee does an excavation here but they find no remains… But it must have triggered something about Yerolakko that they start another exhumation further up…
Our next stop is Kaputi where a Turkish Cypriot reader of mine has arranged with one of his Greek Cypriot friends to meet us and show us the possible burial site of some Greek Cypriots in the area…
We meet them and they show us the area and tell us the story that they know… When there had been heavy rains there came out a burial in this area and they could see the boots…
In fact there has been extensive digging in this area by the Cyprus Missing Persons' Committee without any results… Many of my Turkish Cypriot readers remember very distinctly this particular area – this is the area where you go from Morphou to Kapouti, on the big bend… This road has been built after 1974 but the old road is still visible down below… From early 2005 until now, many of my Turkish Cypriot readers told me that when they were being settled as refugees from villages from the southern part of our island to Morphou, on their way here they saw freshly dug burial sites, even some parts of the bodies sticking out since perhaps they had not been buried properly… But over the years, there has been too much trampling in this area: The military dig for optic lines, they dig for building new roads and according to some information the burial might have been removed from here…
My Turkish Cypriot reader calls another witness and he comes and tells us that as far as he can remember, after the rains years ago as the burial came out as the soil was washed away by the water, they might have removed this burial to the cemetery or elsewhere… We thank them all and go back to Nicosia…
Soon after the Cyprus Missing Persons' Committee begins a fresh round of excavations in this area but again without results…
Perhaps one day we will find out what happened to the `missing` persons buried here and who took them to rebury elsewhere…
Meanwhile we will continue to investigate and see if we are lucky enough to find a witness who might know what had happened to the burial site on the big bend on the road going from Morphou to Kapouti…
I thank all my readers for having enough courage to break zones of silence about the possible burial sites of `missing persons` and want to encourage more people to speak up – this is the only way we can heal the wounds of the past… The more we remain silent, the wound would get bigger and deeper and never heal… The more we speak up, the more closures we bring to the relatives of `missing persons` so that they don't have to wait any longer for any news about their loved ones… This should be our priority in a country full of pain and suffering…
6.6.2014
Photo: The stream in Komurdju...
(*) Article published in the POLITIS newspaper on the 6th of July 2014, Sunday.
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