logo
episode-header-image
Jul 2024
51m 5s

Cyprus: Coups and clubbing

Bbc World Service
About this episode

We hear Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot perspectives on the island's 1974 coup and subsequent invasion. Bekir Azgun, a Turkish-Cypriot writer, remembers the events.

On the 20 July 1974 Captain Adamos Marneros landed the final flight at Nicosia Airport.

Nicoletta Demetriou talks about returning to her family home in 2003.

Then, a Cypriot Olympic sailing hero Pavlos Kontides takes us back to the London 2012 Games.

And finally the 'Godfather of Ayia Napa', DJ Nick Power, tells us how the island became a party destination.

Max Pearson presents this week's Witness History interviews on the history of Cyprus. Our guest is Dr Antigone Heraclidou, senior research associate at CYENS Centre of Excellence in Cyprus.

(Photo: Greek Cypriot soldier killed in the 1974 conflict. Credit: Sean Gallup/Getty Images)

Up next
Aug 23
BlackBerry phones and Spot the dog
Max Pearson presents a collection of the week's Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service. Our guest is Jacquie McNish, author and former Senior Correspondent at the Wall Street Journal.We start with the former co-CEO of BlackBerry, who recounts the company's remarkab ... Show More
59m 7s
Aug 15
Indonesian history
Max Pearson presents a collection of the week’s Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service.Our guest is Dr Anne-Lot Hoek, a research fellow at the International Institution of Social History in Amsterdam.This week, we’re looking at key moments in Indonesian history, as ... Show More
50m 20s
Aug 9
Nagasaki bomb and Brazil’s biggest bank heist
Max Pearson presents a collection of the week’s Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service. Our guest is Simone Turchetti, Professor of the History of Science and Technology, at The University of Manchester in the UK. It's 80 years since the US dropped atomic bombs on ... Show More
50m 52s
Recommended Episodes
Jul 2024
Cyprus 1974: The Greek coup
On 15 July 1974, the Greek military dictatorship in Athens sponsored a coup on the eastern Mediterranean island of Cyprus, aiming to overthrow its selected president and unite the island with Greece. Days later, Turkey invaded the island, taking a third of it and displacing many ... Show More
9m 13s
Sep 2024
Assignment: The 'ghost city' of Cyprus
The once glamorous Cypriot beach resort of Varosha has stood empty and frozen in time since war divided the island 50 years ago, but it is now partially open to tourists and there are hotly contested plans for its renewal.Maria Margaronis speaks to Varosha's former inhabitants - ... Show More
26m 58s
Jul 2024
The missing people of Cyprus
Between 1963 and 1974, more than 2,000 people in Cyprus went missing during clashes, a coup and the Turkish invasion. Only about half of them have been found. Rachel Naylor speaks to Nick Neokleous, the President of the Organisation of Relatives of Missing Cypriots, whose brother ... Show More
9m 55s
Jul 2024
How Ayia Napa became a clubbing capital
In the 1990s, Ayia Napa, in Cyprus, went from quiet fishing village to party resort.The Kool Club was one of the first nightclubs to open in 1995.Rachel Naylor speaks to founder and DJ Nick Power, the 'godfather of Ayia Napa'.Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witne ... Show More
9m 1s
Nov 2024
How Greece got rid of their king
In 1974, Greece held a referendum to decide the future of the country’s monarchy, and whether Constantine II would remain their king.Constantine had come to the throne in 1964, but he’d inherited a divided country. Political divisions, between the left and right, ran deep. In 196 ... Show More
9m 13s
Oct 2024
Pyrrhus: Warlord of Ancient Greece
It’s 279 BC. On a large plain in Southern Italy near the town of Asculum, a famous Greek warlord likened to Alexander the Great faces down the legions of the Roman Republic. His name was Pyrrhus of Epirus. And the victory that he won at Asculum would come to define his legacy. In ... Show More
1h 7m
Jul 31
133 - Wargaming: A Turkish Invasion of Northern Cyprus
Cyprus sits at a persistent impasse, divided between the Republic of Cyprus in the south and the Turkish-backed administration in the north. Despite decades of negotiations, reunification remains elusive, and the island has quietly become one of the most militarised borders in Eu ... Show More
1h 8m
Aug 17
Ghost cities FC
Qarabag FK is not only a refugee football club but also the most successful team in Azerbaijan. Located in Baku, they originally hail from the 'ghost' city of Aghdam, in the Nagorno Karabakh region of the South Caucasus. When a war broke out between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the ... Show More
49m 23s
Jul 2022
Turkquake!
Having flitted around the edges of the Ottoman Empire for most of this season, now we’re going straight to the jugular: the heart of that empire, the city of Istanbul (or Constantinople, if you prefer). In this episode of Conflicted, we tell the thrilling story of the epic histor ... Show More
59m 33s
Aug 2024
The Parthenon: Wonder of Athens
It is the most famous monument of ancient Greece. Its remains standing tall above modern Athens today, more than 2,000 years old. The Parthenon. A temple, treasury, the residence of a powerful general after Alexander the Great’s death…and his courtesans, a church, a mosque, a gun ... Show More
58m 44s