Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Sunday headed to the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) to attend ceremonies marking the 51st anniversary of the Cyprus Peace Operation, known as Peace and Freedom Day.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, Health Minister Kemal Memişoğlu, deputy speaker of Turkish parliament Bekir Bozdağ, Communications Director Burhanettin Duran, and chief presidential adviser Akif Çağatay Kılıç, accompanied the president on his flight.
During the visit, Erdoğan will meet his TRNC counterpart Ersin Tatar and attend the opening of the Lefkosa Northern Ring Road Interchange and Connecting Roads.
Cyprus has been mired in a decades-long dispute between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, despite a series of diplomatic efforts by the UN 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 of the island led to Türkiye's military intervention as a guarantor power to protect Turkish Cypriots from persecution and violence. As a result, 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 UK.
The Greek Cypriot Administration entered the EU in 2004, the same year that Greek Cypriots single-handedly blocked a UN plan to end the longstanding dispute.
