Speech by Oz Karahan

Spinelli 3G3, European Parliament

11 December 2024

Today, under the roof of the European Parliament, we will address the intertwining of transnational organized crimes and crimes against humanity that continue to occur in the occupied territories of the European Union.

By the end of the day, we will understand why the usurpation of Cypriot property in the occupied territory of Cyprus is not a “personal matter”, but a criminal conspiracy that concerns the entire world, including our state, the Republic of Cyprus, and the European Union, of which we are a part.

As Cypriots, we entered 2024 with a new matter. Akan Kürşat, a Turkish Cypriot lawyer, was arrested in Italy on a European Arrest Warrant related to the usurpation of Greek Cypriot properties.

This case was linked to Gary Robb, a British drug trafficker who built over three hundred luxury villas on land usurped in 2004.

In February 2024, the Union of Cypriots, in collaboration with the Green Party of Cyprus, issued statements urging the government of the Republic of Cyprus to promptly fulfill its duty. We called on the government to take decisive action and to pursue unity and joint efforts to address the illegal usurpation of Cypriot properties in the occupied areas.

However, the case against Akan Kürşat was closed with the excuse that “the only witness is dead.”

This decision had serious consequences.

Turkish and foreign companies breathed a sigh of relief and continued plundering the usurped properties in the occupied part of Cyprus.

Tens of thousands of housing projects were subsequently announced. In 2016, the highest number of housing units built in the occupied part of Cyprus was recorded, with just under seven thousand units. After Akan Kürşat was set free, a U.S.-based company alone launched a project for thirty thousand housing units, while a Turkish company initiated multiple projects totaling fourteen thousand units.

For those involved in the looting of property in the occupied areas, Article 303A, which was added to the relevant law in 2006, classifies the sale, rental, or even advertisement of usurped property in these territories as a criminal offense under the Criminal Code.

It is essential to underline that jurisdiction for this criminal offense lies with the Republic of Cyprus, as affirmed by the Court of Justice of the European Union. Furthermore, it is possible to issue a European Arrest Warrant or an international arrest warrant against those who commit this crime.

Despite this, Cypriot properties in the occupied part of Cyprus and the illegal real estate built on them continue to be marketed by companies based in European Union member states such as the Netherlands and Germany.

Meanwhile, the usurpers, mostly Turkish and Israeli construction companies, are selling these illegal properties at real estate expos held within the European Union.

This process has shown that if Article 303A, which was added to the relevant law in 2006 and punishes land usurpation with up to seven years’ imprisonment, had been enforced in time, the looting in the occupied part of Cyprus could have been prevented. Yet, it is still not too late, and many avenues of struggle remain.

In Cyprus, we face daily examples of how the usurpation of properties in the occupied part of the island is intertwined with transnational organized crime. The latest instance appeared in the news last week and involves a pending case in Larnaca concerning a Bulgarian citizen who is sought for extradition by Georgia. According to reports, his case involves drug trafficking, money laundering, and the usurpation of properties in the occupied part of Cyprus. We know that the cases appearing in the media represent just the tip of the iceberg of those concerning not only Cyprus but also European Union institutions.

Today, the usurpation of property in the occupied part of Cyprus continues, also complicating the resolution of the Cyprus problem itself. The increasing number of illegal settlers and the presence of forty thousand occupying troops have turned Turkish Cypriots into a minority in the occupied part of Cyprus.

In other words, the influx of illegal settlers and settlements, as well as the presence of occupying soldiers, creates problems for both Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots.

According to figures provided by the official responsible for population transfer under the occupation regime at the time, between 1975 and 1979, a total of 82,500 settlers from Turkey were brought in during the initial phase. At that time, the number of native Turkish Cypriots living in the occupied region of Cyprus was approximately 110,000. In other words, immediately after the occupation, the number of settlers from Turkey was nearly equal to the number of Turkish Cypriots.

Turkish Cypriot politicians and intellectuals who opposed these actions, such as Kutlu Adalı, were targeted by the Turkish occupation regime. Due to ongoing political, cultural, and economic oppression, many Turkish Cypriots left the island and emigrated to other countries.

In 2011, the statistical agency of the occupation regime reported the number of native Cypriots living in the occupied area as one hundred twenty thousand. This figure was confirmed in 2016 when President Nicos Anastasiades stated that one hundred seventeen thousand Turkish Cypriots held Cypriot citizenship. In January 2024, the union of muhtars, who maintain records of residents in neighborhoods, the smallest administrative unit in the occupied part of Cyprus, reported that the population in the occupied part of Cyprus exceeds one million. This figure is further corroborated by data from the so-called institutions of the occupied area, including increases in the number of housing units, registered vehicles, and GSM operator subscribers.

In the United Nations demilitarized zone of Nicosia, Cypriot political party representatives, consisting of both Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots, have been meeting since 1989, initially under the auspices of the Czechoslovak Embassy, and later continued by the Slovak Embassy. In September this year, the Green Party of Cyprus hosted a meeting titled “Ending Usurpation of Greek Cypriot Properties as a Crucial Confidence-Building Measure to Enhance the Solution to the Cyprus Problem.”

The final communiqué of this meeting, agreed upon by representatives of both Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot political parties and dated September 25, 2024, stated that the usurpation of properties in the occupied part of Cyprus “affects fundamental human rights, tends to eliminate restitution — namely, as one of the agreed remedies for the property issue, thus deteriorating the nature of the solution to the Cyprus problem and the daily life of all Cypriots.”

Settler colonialism constitutes war crimes and crimes against humanity under the 1949 Geneva Conventions and the 1998 Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. As the occupying power, Turkey is transferring populations to alter the demographic structure of Cyprus. This crime is not subject to any statute of limitations under international law, as affirmed by the 1968 United Nations Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity.

I ask you: how can a country remain occupied for fifty years?

The answer lies in the elimination of the indigenous population and the usurpation of their land. This is a crime against humanity known as settler colonialism.

A case addressing settler colonialism and Turkey’s crimes in Cyprus is now before the International Criminal Court. Costas Mavrides, a Member of the European Parliament who is present here today, took a historic initiative in 2014 to bring Turkey’s war crimes in Cyprus to the ICC.

On June 15, 2021, ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda referred this case to her successor, Karim Khan, for a decision. We hope Prosecutor Karim Khan will show the same dedication to Cyprus as he has to the events in neighboring Palestine, which is also a victim of settler colonialism.

Meanwhile, foreign interventions in the sovereignty of the Republic of Cyprus continue — not only by Turkey. Reports indicate that Israeli President Isaac Herzog intervened with Cypriot President Nicos Christodoulides regarding the arrest of Simon Mistriel Aykut, a citizen of Israel, Turkey, and Portugal. It is appalling that the leader of a country responsible for the same crimes as Turkey would attempt to interfere another nation’s legal process on behalf of a land usurper.

We are aware that, given the circumstances in Cyprus where an ongoing occupation persists, it is maybe difficult for our state to obtain the hard evidence necessary to address cases of property usurpation. Therefore, in August 2024, we published the names of dozens of companies and their owners involved in the usurpation of property in the occupied areas of Cyprus. We also publicized these actions to assist our state institutions in taking the necessary measures. Because it is deeply troubling to citizens that these usurpers, along with the politicians and institutions that support them, are still able to access areas controlled by the Republic of Cyprus or travel to Europe for business and other purposes. As Cypriot citizens, we expect our state, as well as the European Union and its institutions, to take meaningful action after half a century of these ongoing crimes.

I would also like to emphasize that the struggle against occupation and settler colonialism must include calls for sanctions, embargoes, and boycotts. This approach was recently articulated in the “Declaration of Pan-Cyprian Mobilization for the Freedom of Cyprus”, signed by hundreds of intellectuals, academics, journalists, and active Cypriot citizens from all backgrounds. We must employ all legal, political, and economic tools to combat Turkey’s ongoing crimes in Cyprus. The institutions of both our state and the European Union must take action, and we, as Cypriots, will continue to pressure them to fulfill their responsibilities.

Finally, the claim that “the usurpation of property in the occupied part of Cyprus will be resolved with the Cyprus problem” is not just wrong and ineffective but also destructive. For Cypriots, the Cyprus problem is not an intercommunal political issue, as some try to frame it. It is a problem of occupation and colonization. It is also shameful when those who argue that the Cyprus issue is merely a political dispute between two communities suggest that solving it is the only way to prevent crimes against humanity. Ending crimes against humanity cannot and should not depend on the resolution of a political problem.

It is also appalling that advocates of this shameful idea, who are effectively whitewashing crimes against humanity, propose apartheid-like political solutions to the Cyprus problem. Such proposals would allow Turkey to evade accountability for its crimes, including settler colonization and land usurpation.

As I mentioned at the beginning, the Turkish occupation today is intertwined with crimes against humanity, widespread human rights violations, and transnational organized crime. Addressing these issues urgently and seriously is a duty for all of us.

Cypriots, like any other nation in the world, deserve to live in their homeland in peace, security, and with the dignity every human deserves.

The Usurpation of Properties in the Occupied Part of Cyprus

• Speech by Aziz Şah

The Usurpation of Properties in the Occupied Part of Cyprus

Spinelli 3G3, European Parliament

11 December 2024

I am here as a journalist from the part of Cyprus that has been under Turkish occupation since 1974. Turkey has occupied 37% of the sovereign territory of the Republic of Cyprus. To perpetuate this occupation, it has systematically committed crimes under the Geneva Convention and the Rome Statute.

The first of these crimes is the “crime of forced displacement and settler population transfer.”

The second is “the crime of unlawful and arbitrary destruction and seizure of property.”

What do the war crimes and crimes against humanity that Turkey has systematically committed in Cyprus for half a century mean for humanity?

Crimes that go unpunished are repeated!

Article 49 of the 1949 Geneva Convention states that “The Occupying Power shall not deport or transfer parts of its own civilian population into the territory it occupies.” I would like to remind you that this article was written to prevent a repeat of the colonization policies pursued by the Nazis in the territories they occupied during the Second World War.

For 50 years, Turkey has been trampling on international law in Cyprus, including the European Convention on Human Rights, the Hague Conventions, the Geneva Convention, the Rome Statute, and the Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes Against Humanity.

The basis of Turkey’s usurpation of land in Cyprus is the construction of settlements and the transfer of population to the occupied territory, which are war crimes according to the Geneva Convention and the Rome Statute.

However, the issue does not stop with these war crimes:

There are two other pillars of land usurpation: “money laundering,” defined as a transnational organized crime, and “infiltration of legal business to launder money.” Both are directly linked to land usurpation.

Building on usurped land is part of the trafficking-drugs-money laundering cycle.

Cypriot journalists have also documented construction companies brokering human trafficking from Asia and Africa. Cyprus ranks first in the European Union for first-time asylum seekers per capita. The Purnara Refugee Camp in the Republic of Cyprus is overcrowded with migrants who were brought to the occupied territory under the guise of being “workers.”

Black money in the occupied part of Cyprus enters the world and EU market through shell companies.

In 2024, five individuals were prosecuted in the courts of the Republic of Cyprus for land usurpation and money laundering crimes, following complaints by Cypriot refugees who were expelled from their homes in 1974. There are hundreds more predatory construction and real estate companies that have committed crimes.

The most prominent of these detainees is Simon Mistriel Aykut, a Turkish citizen (who also holds Israeli and Portuguese citizenship) and director of the AFIK construction company.

Apart from Aykut, an Israeli, two Hungarian, and a German real estate agent have also been indicted for usurpation and money laundering following complaints by Cypriot refugees.

Land usurpation in Cyprus does not only concern Cypriots.

The usurpation cases also affect the German and Hungarian states and the EU, because the usurped properties were sold and advertised through Hungarian and German real estate companies.

Was the money from these illegal transactions in the occupied part of Cyprus transferred to Germany and Hungary? If so, how?

These simple questions alone show that the issue of land usurpation in the occupied part of Cyprus is an EU issue as well.

The case of Simon Mistriel Aykut, the director of the AFIK company, who committed war crimes and usurped individual property rights by building settlements on the land of refugees expelled at gunpoint in 1974, is even more complex. AFIK, the company that committed the crime of land usurpation in Cyprus, also operates in Germany, Greece, Turkey, and Israel. According to documents published by Cypriot journalists, the Aykut family also owns companies in the Cayman Islands, the Netherlands, and the Republic of Cyprus.

Land usurpation in Cyprus is a serious transnational crime for the EU. The settlements built on the usurped land are funded with black money of unknown origin. These properties are marketed worldwide, including in Europe, by Russian, Iranian, Israeli, German, British, Hungarian, and Eastern European real estate agents and companies.

This is similar to the illegal settlements in the West Bank, and potentially Gaza in the future, that are being marketed by European companies.

The settlement policies of Turkey and Israel in the occupied territories are similar. This is also evident in United Nations resolutions:

For Cyprus, Resolutions 33/15 (1978), 34/30 (1979), 37/253 (1983), 4 (XXXII) (1976), and 1987/50 (1987) state that “changes in the demographic structure of Cyprus continue with the influx of large numbers of settlers” and argue that “all unilateral actions changing the demographic structure” obstruct the return of refugees and all displaced persons to their homes.

For Israel, Resolutions 446 (1979), 452 (1979), 465 (1980), and 2234 (2015) call on it to “cease illegal settlement construction in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which is an obstacle to peace.”

Criticizing Israel’s settlement policy in the occupied Palestinian territories, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan recently said:

“You (Israel) are occupying someone’s land. You’re seizing their home, throwing them out, bringing somebody (else) in, and calling them ‘settlers.’ This is called theft.”

When Fidan criticizes Israel’s settler colonialism, he is describing the very crime of destruction of property and land usurpation that Turkey has perpetuated in occupied Cyprus for the past 50 years.

Indeed, as Hakan Fidan states, settler colonialism is theft.

In summary, it is essential to understand that, in addition to war crimes, land usurpation in Cyprus constitutes part of “transnational organized crime,” defined by the UN in 1994 to include crimes such as “terrorist acts, human trafficking, and arms and drug trafficking.”

So, what is the political motivation behind Turkey’s settlement construction carried out through real estate and construction companies?

Turkey’s policy of land usurpation aims to permanently undermine any settlement in Cyprus based on the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights and the EU acquis.

After 1974, Turkey systematically established a racist apartheid regime. First, Greek Cypriots, Maronites and Armenians were expelled from their homes. In 1975, the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued a “directive” to move settlers to Cyprus. According to this directive, “families resettled in Cyprus must be Turkish citizens and their mother tongue must be Turkish.” Settler colonization seeks to Turkify Cyprus.

When Turkey began illegally settling people in the occupied part of Cyprus in 1975, the properties were not empty. Approximately 20,000 Greek Cypriots had remained in their homes. After 50 years of ethnic cleansing, only about 300 remain today.

In 1995, the occupation regime enacted the “Settlement, Land Distribution, and Equivalent Property (ITEM) Law,” paving the way for the sale and construction on usurped land. The construction boom accelerated after 1995.

The transformation continued with the negotiation of the Annan Plan for the settlement of the Cyprus problem between 2001 and 2004. According to the Annan Plan, the usurpers would have priority over the original owners. Although the plan was rejected, the occupation regime continues to use it as a basis for land usurpation.

A total of 694 houses were built in the occupied part of Cyprus in 1993. In 2003, with the Annan Plan, this number doubled to 1,354. In 2013, 2,882 houses were built and in 2023 this number will rise to 4,141. The construction boom continues exponentially…

Land grabbing in a country occupied by a foreign power is not a “personal matter” for refugees to solve on their own.

According to international law, occupation is a temporary situation, the occupation regime cannot have permanent effects on immovable property. Private property cannot be usurped. Permanent settlements cannot be established to change the status of land.

Many Cypriot refugees have brought individual cases before the European Court of Human Rights. The Court could not cope with the burden of these cases. As a result, the Immovable Property Commission under the occupation regime was established 19 years ago following a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights.

According to the Commission’s statement, as of November 29, 2024, a total of 7,849 applications had been submitted, of which 1,892 had been evaluated.

This means that out of approximately 170,000 refugees, only 1,892 files were evaluated in 19 years!

Moreover, the Immovable Property Commission awards a maximum of one-tenth of the property’s value as compensation. These compensations often go unpaid for years. This is because, for a Commission decision to be implemented, it must be signed and accepted by an official of the occupation regime. Files remain pending for years without a signature, further exacerbating the victimization of refugees.

The Immovable Property Commission has become part of the problem, not the solution. Because the occupation regime and the European Court of Human Rights do not have the same goal in the property issue.

Beyond solving the problem, the Immovable Property Commission has caused an avalanche of land looting. The establishment of the Commission was a guarantee for the usurpers. Realizing that they would be able to get away with the property they usurped without paying any price, the companies accelerated their land looting.

Today, the Immovable Property Commission is being used as a weapon against refugees. Because Cypriot refugees were prevented from even filing a compensation case at the European Court of Human Rights, the usurpers were relieved. This is also a violation of human rights: According to Article 34 of the European Convention on Human Rights, the effective exercise of the right to apply to the European Court of Human Rights cannot be prevented in any way.

The right of return of refugees and their descendants is a right recognized by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the Fourth Geneva Convention.

The transfer of Cypriot refugees’ property cases by the European Court of Human Rights to the Immovable Property Commission in the occupation regime has emboldened land usurpation.

It is unacceptable that refugees are left alone on the grounds that “property is a personal matter”. Refugees lost their property in the war… Land usurpation in Cyprus is not a “personal matter”. It is an occupying power altering the status of land and the identity of a country, which constitutes a war crime and is part of transnational organized crime, including money laundering.

Georghios M. Pikis of Cyprus, a founding judge of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the first President of its Appeals Chamber, served from 2003 to 2009 after the Court was established under the Rome Statute to prosecute war crimes and crimes against humanity. In a conference on the ICC, he stated:

“Without justice there can be no peace and without peace, human existence is left at the mercy of the ill passions of the strong for power, domination, riches and sequential inhuman acts.”

As Cypriots, we want the International Criminal Court to work for Cyprus. The human rights of Cypriots cannot be left at the mercy of the occupier. The plundered land and usurped human rights belong to all Cypriots.

“There can be no peace without justice.”

The Usurpation of Properties in the Occupied Part of Cyprus