Update on the Missing Persons of Cyprus from the 1974 Turkish Invasion
Abstract
The paper aims to give up-to-date information on the situation of the missing persons
of Cyprus from the 1974 illegal Turkish invasion of the island Republic. It is simply an
overview of the situation and how it has evolved as a humanitarian issue over more than
three decades. The Cyprus humanitarian issue of missing persons refers to about 1,464
Greek Cypriot missing persons and 502 cases of Turkish Cypriot missing persons - both
military personnel and civilians, including women and children. Following relevant
United Nations General Assembly resolutions, a Committee on missing persons (CMP)
was established in 1981, which operates under the United Nations (UN). The CMP
officially began its program for exhumations and identification of the missing persons
on 30 June 2005 — By June 2009 the remains of 196 individuals have been identified
from more than 600 exhumed — 145 of these remains belong to Greek-Cypriot and
51 Turkish-Cypriot missing persons.