The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) owes its freedom to the "valiant martyrs" of the Erenköy Resistance, said the country's President Ersin Tatar on Monday.
Speaking at a ceremony marking the 57th anniversary of the Erenköy Resistance, when Turkish Cypriots defended themselves against Greek Cypriots in 1964, 10 years before Türkiye's historic Cyprus Peace Operation, Tatar said: "Today, we commemorate the noble struggle and the history made in Erenköy 58 years ago."
Tatar went on to say that the Erenköy Resistance has a place of honor equivalent to the famed World War I Battle of Çanakkale (Gallipoli) in Turkish history, adding that the Turkish Cypriots took their place in the glorious history of resistance thanks to the heroism and valor of those who stood up in Erenköy.
The resistance in Erenköy is a source of inspiration for the Turkish Cypriot struggle for existence, he added.
Underlining how the Turkish Cypriots resisted the Greek Cypriot plan for Enosis (union with Greece), he said young Turkish Cypriots studying in Türkiye and the United Kingdom dropped out of school and went to Erenköy, where they swore an oath to the resistance.
Tatar also paid tribute to Capt. Cengiz Topel, a Turkish Air Force pilot whose plane was shot down on Aug. 7, 1964 while on a warning flight over Greek Cypriot soldiers firing on Turkish residents on the island.
Topel was tortured to death, in violation of the Geneva Convention.
Cyprus has been mired in a decadeslong dispute between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, despite a series of diplomatic efforts by the United Nations to achieve a comprehensive settlement.
Ethnic attacks starting in the early 1960s forced Turkish Cypriots to withdraw into enclaves for their safety.
In 1974, a Greek Cypriot coup aimed at Greece's annexation led to the Turkish military intervention as a guarantor power to protect Turkish Cypriots from persecution and violence. The TRNC was founded in 1983.
It has seen an on-and-off peace process in recent years, including a failed 2017 initiative in Switzerland under the auspices of guarantor countries Türkiye, Greece and the United Kingdom.
The Greek Cypriot administration entered the European Union in 2004, the same year Greek Cypriots thwarted the U.N.'s Annan Plan to end the longstanding dispute.
Today, the Turkish side supports a solution based on the equal sovereignty of the two states on the island. On the other hand, the Greek side wants a federal solution based on the hegemony of the Greeks.