Our stolen childhood... (*)

It is not only Avrupa/Afrika newspaper but on the same day, the cases against Yeniduzen newspaper and the columnist Tema Irkad are also `dropped` in the same way… The judge Oner Gurman says `Since 2000 these cases have been in front of the court. The attorneys always asked for time… It’s been five years…`

Almost each month both Shener Levent and other writers of Afrika newspaper as well as Tema Irkad from Yeniduzen had to visit the court and be present there. It was the regime suing them therefore, they had to appear before the court otherwise they would be arrested one night before to ensure that they appeared in court…

The judge thinks that the human rights of the journalists as well as the basic law has been damaged so he cancels all the cases: 131 against Afrika and 5 against Yeniduzen, totaling 136 cases which foresaw thousands of years of imprisonment of journalists…

I speak with Shener afterwards:

`Have you ever heard anywhere in the world something like this?` he says… `That in one day, 136 cases be dropped by the court? Did it ever happen anywhere?`

Who will redeem the amount of suffering that Shener Levent and his friends, Tema Irkad and all other persecuted journalists have gone through? Is there a court who can pay back the oppression we had to go through? Who will heal the wounds and who will redress what we had to go through all these years?

The regime wants to clean up its act in the northern part of the island: all of a sudden a court in Famagusta discovers that Varosha actually belonged to a Turkish Cypriot foundation… The whole of Varosha! It never belonged to Greek Cypriots but the British stole the land and distributed it to Greek Cypriots! So Arestis must be wrong, thinking that her house actually belongs to her! No it doesn’t! Her parents must have stolen it from Turks! And the court found the evidence hidden, at the cellar of a hotel in Varosha! The hidden evidence showed that Varosha was distributed by the British between 1910 and 1930 and all the kochani belonged to Turks! What about international law? What is that?!… What about those people who have lost their homes in Varosha? Who will redress their wounds?

The regime wants to clean up its act in the northern part of the island and legitimize the occupation: The property speculators decide to collect money amongst themselves to fight the Greek Cypriot cases in courts! Months ago, one of my friends studying law in London tells me:

`You know what Sevgul? They made an agreement with Cherie Blair and her fee is one million sterling pounds!`

`You must be kidding!`

`No! They made a deal…`

Months after, my friend’s news comes out to be true… Cherie Blair is going to fight the Greek Cypriot property cases in courts in London… It is not relevant if she has ever visited Cyprus or not… It is not relevant whether she understands the pain of Cypriots who have been living in conflict or not… It is not relevant whether she understands what being a refugee and losing everything or not. It does not matter whether she is interested in the pain of Arestis or Meletis or all the refugees whether they are Turkish Cypriot or Greek Cypriot… Money talks. And that’s it…

And it does not matter whether she is the First Lady in London… Our guarantor has ways of showing us what it thinks – our guarantor is also helping the regime in the north in cleaning up the house and legitimizing the occupation…

The regime wants to clean up its act in the northern part of the island: the occupation must be legitimized, getting ready for two separate states… The house must look clean and tidy and we must all forget the presence of 40 thousand Turkish troops on the island… We must forget the military zones, we must forget the change of the structure of population, we must forget the struggle for peace and democracy… Just like a computer, we must reload our programs in accordance with the agenda of the regime: it is an old program but needs fine-tuning… The `enemies` are still there – they are the Greek Cypriots, who don’t want us, don’t like us, don’t want to share anything with us! We need to reload our memories with a more refined version and get ready for a new trend: Turkish Cypriot nationalism, based on `Nobody should rule us! We must rule ourselves!` giving a message to Greek Cypriots but forgetting the heavy but refined presence of Ankara in Cyprus.

On Wednesday, I sit with Panos Shamatas from Drachona to talk about his childhood… He is a refugee of 1963… He was born in 1952… My husband was born in 1950… My husband was also a refugee of Omorphita in 1963… They were almost neighbours and maybe many times their paths could have crossed. Panos had friends as a child, Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots and they would play hide and seek and in Kucuk’s field, they would build imaginary houses… They would play lingiri, fly kites and climb the beginning of the Pentadaktilos… In 1963, a gang from TMT attacked Drachona – Panos, together with his brothers and sister, mother and father, hid in the house of a neighbor: a Turkish Cypriot woman, who saved their lives… The gang wanted to burn the house of the Shamatas but the Turkish Cypriot neighbor begged them not to do it… She also saved their house… He and his family became a refugee, living for months in one single room and never being able to go back to his house… Today, 2 years after the checkpoints are open, he tells me his story: `As a child everything seemed big… When I visited my house, it seemed smaller… I could not live in that house now… A family from Turkey lives in that house…` The only thing that remains is the pain and the fact that it was Turkish Cypriot neighbors who saved his and his family’s lives…

Almost on the same days and nights, Samson and his gang was attacking Omorphita so my husband Zeki and his family became a refugee – they too, had to live in one single room for quite a long time, never being able to return to their home again… He, too, suffered just like Panos and I hope they can meet to share memories of the area and their stolen childhood…

Panos says, `It was as though, from that day on, I grew up in one night…` reflecting the experience of my husband as well… All the children of 63 grew up one night, as it would happen again in 74…

What does it matter these stories, these stolen childhoods to Madame Blair or those playing games in power politics? Who cares about the fears of a child of those times? Who cares to treat these wounds and bring some form of justice and redress so that at last, people, whether they are Turkish Cypriots or Greek Cypriots can breathe more easily? Who cares about the meaning of a house, a home, no matter how small, as your sanctuary in life?

Now is the time for courts and courts are not places for feelings… Courts cannot measure out and calculate the amount of pain inflicted by the conflict on the people on this land… It cannot measure out the pain of the victims of rape or the loss of joy of life of those who have lost their loved ones in massacres…

Courts cannot redeem the stolen childhood of our people – the stolen dreams, the games, the laughter and the carelessness of children… Power politics don’t deal with such things: the only thing they care about is to `win points` and `win positions`…

We must deal with our own pain, our own wounds, our own stolen childhood, our own divided home Cyprus…

(*) Article published in the ALITHIA newspaper on the 1st of January 2006.

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