‘Occupy Ledra Street’ has UN’s blessing

By Simon Bahceli Published on November 24, 2011
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UNITED Nations Forces in Cyprus (UNFICYP) said yesterday they had no plans to remove pro-Cyprus-reunification protesters who have been camped out in the buffer zone checkpoint in central Nicosia’s Ledra Street for the past five days.  

“We support the freedom of expression, and we have make no decision on their removal,” UNFICYP spokesman Michael Bonnardeaux told the Cyprus Mail. Bonnardeaux added that no requests had been received from either the Greek or Turkish Cypriot authorities for their removal. 

Last night marked the fifth night of the “Occupy Ledra Street” protest’s permanent camp in the buffer zone between opposing Turkish and Greek Cypriot forces. The crossing comes under UNFICYP jurisdiction and policing.

Since the protest began on Saturday night, attendance has been increasing with protesters gathering to air their anger at the island’s continued division and the global financial status quo, which they say is the main cause of global poverty. On Monday and Tuesday nights, the demonstrators were joined by musicians, while yesterday group discussions and more music was said to be on the agenda for the evening.   

Although Bonnardeaux said UN officials had noticed some “offensive graffiti directed at the UN”, the protesters were found to be “friendly and non-violent”. 

“So we are letting it happen,” he said.

The protest has however caused some inconvenience to UN forces, who have been on the island permanently since 1964. 

“It is not an ideal place for a protest as it is very small space. And it is the only patrol road we have, so we have had to reorganise our patrols to go around it,” the spokesman said. 

Protesters at Ledra Street yesterday said they were pleased with the UN’s decision not to break up their protest, but said they planned to continue their occupation of Ledra Street “indefinitely”. 

“We will stay here until we see a change, and until there is one Cyprus,” Michalis Eleftheriou, a 26 linguist who has been with the protest since it began as a weekly event in October. 

“Globally, there are more people on the streets saying ‘I understand how things work and we need a complete shift,” he added.

Since the weekend, protesters have moved in around eight tents, desks and office equipment, a generator, and a makeshift kitchen. Rubbish, they say, is collected and taken for recycling. In the evenings heating is provided by a fire in an oil drum. All funding for the protest has been provided by the protesters themselves and is collected on a daily basis. 

Many among the protesters occupying the busy buffer zone crossing say their protest is inspired by the global “Occupy movement”, which is primarily aimed at disrupting financial capitals like Wall Street and the City of London. However, Eleftheriou says Occupy Ledra Street is more akin to the popular uprisings that began in Tunisia earlier this year and continue to spread around the world.   

“We are coming up to a year of unrest that started in Tunisia, spread to Arab countries and spread to Europe with Democracia Real in Spain and the resistance in Greece. This is an extension of that,” he said.

Eleftheriou added that he saw Cyprus’ local problems and those of the global community as inextricably linked. 

“We can’t have a healthy island in an unhealthy world,” he said.

Another of the protesters, 26 year-old sociologist Rahme Veziroglu, who last week appeared on Al Jazeera television along with Eleftheriou to speak about the protest, said she wished to emphasise that the protest should be inclusive of “all those who care about Cyprus”. 

“It’s not about labels. It is inclusive because we are talking about all the problems the system has created. We might think these are related to the global capitalist system, but if people disagree we can discuss and find a middle way,” she said.