A total of 17,000 Russian nationals have applied for consular services at the office in northern Nicosia which provides those services, the country’s ambassador in Nicosia Murat Zyazikov said on Saturday.

“Previously, they had to travel to other countries, or, after overcoming significant difficulties, cross the dividing line which divides Cyprus into two parts,” he told Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda.

He added that before Russia’s office, which is located on northern Nicosia’s arterial Dereboyu avenue, opened in 2023, Russian diplomats in Cyprus were “essentially working in the countryside, in the buffer zone”.

Additionally, he said there are around 50,000 Russian passport holders who live either temporarily or permanently in the north.

“The vast majority of them are very patriotic towards Russia,” he said.

Meanwhile on Saturday, the embassy’s consular section head Artem Baikin said the most frequent services requested from the office in the north are notary service, the issuance of passports, and marriage certificates.

The figure of 50,000 Russian nationals living in the north had caused alarm among Turkish Cypriot opposition figures when Russian citizens were able to vote in the north during the country’s presidential elections last year.

Opposition political party CTP leader Tufan Erhurman pointed out the inconsistency between official population projections in the north and the seeming reality given the apparent 50,000 Russian citizens living there.

“What Ustel knew but could not say, what Dursun Oguz did not know, what Tatar said is 410,000, what Akpinar said is a million, it would be useful to add these 50,000 to this population figure, if it exists,” he retorted.