Paralimni: Cyprus will intensify efforts to enforce arrest warrants issued in connection with the killings of Tasos Isaak and Solomos Solomou in August 1996, President Nikos Christodoulides said on Saturday evening, speaking at a memorial event in Paralimni, Famagusta district, marking 30 years since the deaths of the two men.
According to Cyprus News Agency, Christodoulides stated that, following investigations into the killings, the Republic of Cyprus had issued 13 national and five international arrest warrants. He noted that the warrants have not been executed due to the refusal of the occupation regime and Turkey to cooperate.
"I want to promise you tonight that the Republic of Cyprus we will intensify our efforts to enforce the warrants," the President said.
He added that the government had demonstrated in other cases, including those involving usurpers of Greek Cypriot property, that results could be achieved when there was determination.
The President stressed that the case of the two killings remains open. "Accountability and punishment have not ended," he said, describing the prosecution of those responsible as a "universal demand of our people", as well as an obligation of the European Union and a duty of the international community.
"Justice is not an act of revenge. We are not here to take revenge. It is a matter of principle, it is a matter of dignity, and we will pursue it until we achieve it," he said.
Referring to the events of August 1996, the President said the images of Isaak and Solomou had become deeply embedded in the collective memory of Cyprus and the wider Hellenic world. He described the photographs from that period as "irrefutable evidence" of two brutal crimes, saying they had both "moral perpetrators" and "physical perpetrators".
Christodoulides also praised the Isaak-Solomou Memory Initiative and the motorcyclists who continue to commemorate the two men. "Tasos and Solomos did not ask for laurel wreaths, they did not ask for glory. They did not ask for privileges," he said. "They demanded to live free, to move freely, to be free in their homeland," he added.
The President concluded by expressing his support for the families of Isaak and Solomou and for those continuing efforts to keep their memory alive.
Tasos Isaak was beaten to death on 11 August 1996 by a group of attackers during a motorcycle protest near the UN buffer zone in Deryneia. Three days later, on 14 August, Solomos Solomou was shot dead after climbing a flagpole near the buffer zone in an attempt to remove a Turkish flag.
Cyprus has been divided since 1974, when Turkey invaded and occupied its northern third. Repeated rounds of UN-led peace talks have so far failed to yield results. The latest round of negotiations, in July 2017 at the Swiss resort of Crans-Montana ended inconclusively.