Nicosia: The Committee on Missing Persons in Cyprus (CMP) has received a financial contribution of £40,000 from the Hellenic Republic, as announced by the CMP on Monday.
According to Cyprus News Agency, this donation increases Greece’s total financial assistance to the CMP to £425,000 since 2006. The funds are aimed at supporting the Committee’s efforts to identify and return the remains of missing individuals, thereby ending the uncertainty experienced by their families for many years.
Cyprus has faced division since 1974, following an invasion by Turkish troops that resulted in the occupation of 37% of its territory. The fate of hundreds of people remains unresolved since then. In response, a Committee on Missing Persons was established through an agreement between the leaders of the two communities. The Committee’s objective is to exhume, identify, and return the remains of 492 Turkish Cypriots and 1,510 Greek Cypriots who went missing during the inter-communal conflicts of 1963-1964 and in 1974.
The C
MP Project on the Exhumation, Identification, and Return of Remains of Missing Persons in Cyprus, which became operational in 2006, receives co-funding from the European Union. As of now, the project has successfully identified and returned 1,051 missing persons from both Cypriot communities to their families for dignified burials.