Exhumation of TC mass grave in Aloda to start, joint leaders’ visit confirmed

President Nikos Christodoulides on Wednesday is cautiously optimistic over the prospects of a joint visit with Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar, to the committee of missing persons (CMP).

Director of the president’s press office, Victoras Papadopoulos, told CyBC that the president had “expressed the hope that it will be possible to issue a joint statement, so that the right messages are sent on the humanitarian issue of the missing.”

Moreover, Papadopoulos said a meeting between Christodoulides and Tatar would give further impetus to the work of the CMP.

Referring to the efforts to restart negotiations Papadopoulos said that there is now a complete picture of the UN secretary general’s contacts with Turkey, and of intentions regarding the appointment of a UN envoy.

He added that various milestones and a flurry of activity both officially and in the sidelines of other meetings have led to the current cautious optimism.

Christodoulides on Tuesday speaking ahead of an EU and Latin America and Caribbean summit (EU-CELAC), had said that a specific day was discussed, at the end of July, for the joint meeting and that preparations for a joint communiqué were underway.

“I do not see any difficulties in making this visit,” the president said.

In a statement later in the day, Tatar said that he has been expecting to meet with Christodoulides at the CMP, since works in Aloda, an area where the Turkish Cypriot leadership has been pushing for works to be conducted, are set to begin.

Tatar said that he was informed by the CMP that excavations in Aloda, where a Turkish Cypriot mass grave is believed to be located, will start on July 24, 2023.

The mass grave in Aloda, Famagusta, is believed to hold the remains of Turkish Cypriot women and children, victims of atrocities committed August 14, 1974, by Greek Cypriot nationalists, hours before the second stage of the Turkish invasion.

A preliminary bi-communal meeting of GC and TC party delegates to the CMP lab took place on July 17.