This is where the charter planes and scheduled jets of Cyprus Airways once landed: at Nicosia International Airport. But since flight operations had to be suspended overnight in 1974, there has been dead silence after a brief armed conflict.
What was once the largest airport in Cyprus is located in the center of the island, just twelve kilometers west of the metropolis of Nicosia. The buffer zone runs through the area today, separating the two parts of the country from each other since 1974: the south with the Republic of Cyprus and the northern part, which has been known as the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus since – a country that is not recognized by the international community with the exception of Turkey.
The airport, now deserted, symbolizes the divided country. The island, which was once under Ottoman rule and later became a British crown colony, became independent in 1960 after the ratification of the Zurich and London Agreement between Great Britain, Greece and Turkey.
The island of Cyprus divided to this day
But the peace was short-lived. A United Nations peacekeeping force was stationed on the third largest Mediterranean island as early as the 1960s. When the National Guard staged a coup after underground fighting, the Turkish military occupied the north. Nicosia International Airport also came under fire in the conflict in 1974. Two Cyprus Airways jets were destroyed in the fighting.
Since the armistice in August of the same year, the demarcation line has also passed through the airport area. From one day to the next, the airport was deserted. The former British military airport of Larnaca took over the function of an international airport for the south of the country.
On the following pages of the photo series we show pictures of the deserted airport.
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