Blood-curdling massacre confession.
Neoptolemos Leftis and Athos Petridis, two surviving gunmen of the Greek Cypriot armed terrorist organization EOKA (Ethniki Organosis Kiprion Agoniston , ‘National Organization of the Cypriot Warriors’) which committed its first bloody act on April 1st, 1955 in order to end the British colonial rule in Cyprus and to annex the island to Greece (Enosis), confessed to the massacres they had carried out against the Turkish Cypriots as part of an assassination group in 1964.
“We shot 68 Turkish Cypriots and threw them into a pit.”
Neoptolemos Leftis and Athos Petridis confessed to the massacres in cold blood on Omega TV stating that they were members of the group led by Nikos Sampson when EOKA began the attack against the Turkish Cypriots.
Speaking to Greek Cypriot Omega TV in an interview with Soteris Paroutis, the two gunmen said that they loaded 68 civilian and unarmed Turkish Cypriots into large vehicles at different times, in 1964, and took them to Eylence region (the village near Lefkoşa in South Cyprus), got them out of the vehicles and lined them up at the head of the pits, shot and then skewered them. They pushed the Turkish Cypriots they killed into the pit.
“We took 10 Turkish Cypriots lives for one Greek Cypriot life.”
Neoptolemos Leftis stated “after the murder of 2 Greek officers and a Greek Cypriot police officer who were trying to locate the Turkish positions in Famagusta city in 1964. they were ordered to kill 10 Turkish Cypriots for one Greek Cypriot killed and they organized a group of 500 people to implement this order and they went through training”. Leftis said, “We were going to kill 10 Turkish Cypriots for one Greek Cypriot, and that’s how it happened. That’s why we killed 68 Turkish Cypriots. They still ask me about the 68 Turkish Cypriots we killed and their burial places. Where can you find it, so much time has passed”.
“We were eliminating the Turkish Cypriots by shooting them with guns and throwing them into the pits.”
Regarding the massacres they carried out, Athos Petridis said, “We were stopping the vehicles passing near the village of Eylence. Turkish Cypriots were traveling in big cars and buses. We were getting the Turkish Cypriots out of the vehicles and first taking their money and valuables. Then we were shooting, skewering and disposing of them by throwing them into the pits.”
Many more massacres against the Turkish Cypriots were carried out by EOKA until 1974 with the same barbarity confessed to by both gunmen.
Source: TRNC Public Information Office
Picture source: TRNC Public Information website and Ömer BİLGE NICOSIA HÜRRİYET
…such as it is, we wish that more men like them confess to their murdering ways.
Men as these are cowards, whether Turkish or Greek, those who were their victims were not “Them” (and rarely did “They” actually fight each other). Neither armed or “political”, Cypriots were made their victims, those respecting Universal Principles became their target, wanting only their Basic Human Rights they fell easily, their Identity usurped; betrayed by those among them who would place “Greekness” and “Turkishness” above “being” Human.
…indeed, there is not a family in Cyprus untouched by such men; how many families must be divided by them having to live in silence and against Truth. It takes courage to say, “I was there”, “I failed myself most of all by keeping this treachery secret for so long.”
…no man should be forgiven for such crimes; no man who confesses to such crimes should be treated without respect: something to think about.