Greek Cypriot farmers were harassed and physically threatened by members of the Turkish army and police in the buffer zone village of Mammari on Tuesday.
The attacked farmer, Gavriel Yerolemou said that more than 20 Turkish soldiers and police officers attempted to arrest him and his father while they were working in their field, located about 300m from a Turkish outpost.
“They were throwing stones at us, they grabbed me by the throat and tried to arrest us,” he said.
The incident began when a soldier tried to remove the keys from their parked vehicle, prompting the arrival of additional armed personnel who surrounded the area.
Yerolemou said a police officer tried to climb onto his father’s tractor to detain him.
“When he accelerated to get away from the scene, he fell off the tractor. They were shouting at us in Turkish and English, ‘stay’, ‘arrest’ and so on,” he said.
Also speaking to the Cyprus Mail, Yerolemos Yerolemou, the father, reiterated the abuse they faced from the Turkish forces.
“We were simply tending to our fields. How is that provocation? They had their finger on the trigger. The police officer grabbed my son by the neck. They were throwing stones at my tractor and pulling on different parts of the vehicle trying to damage it.”
A Greek Cypriot soldier stationed at the top of the hill in Mammari and overlooking where the incident occured described the events in detail.
He said that at first, they saw the farmer sowing his field when suddenly three soldiers appeared, attempting to stop and confront him.
A white car then arrived near the Turkish watchtower, and five police officers got out and tried to detain the farmers.
For around half an hour, the harassment continued until three UN vehicles arrived, parked about 300 metres from the scene, and a farmer spoke to the UN personnel.
During this time, Turkish soldiers attempted to seize the tractor, yet the farmer and his son managed to prevent it.
As they defended the vehicle, 20 Turkish soldiers appeared, breaking the tractor’s windows in an effort to stop them.
The UN reportedly remained observers throughout the clash.
Another farmer, Christodoulos Christodoulou from neighbouring Denia, described the attack as “the worst incident we have encountered in the last five to six years”.
“We have families, babies and we can’t have the Turks getting on tractors every now and then, breaking our backs. It’s unacceptable, we don’t know what to do.”
UN peacekeepers were reportedly limited to monitoring and recording the situation.
President Nikos Christodoulides has vehemently condemned the incident as “an act of piracy” and said the government had made representations to the UN.
“We are taking this quite seriously. The primary consideration was the safety of locals,” he said, describing the actions of the Turkish army as “unacceptable”.
Residents in Mammari described the atmosphere along the buffer zone yesterday as “very tense,” with the confrontation escalating in the early afternoon.
Mukhtar Nikos Kotsiapasis confirmed that farmers are waiting for the foreign ministry to advise when it will be safe to return to their fields.
