Cyprus has recaptured the international spotlight as regional tensions spill into the eastern Mediterranean. A suspected Iranian drone strike on the British air base at Akrotiri in March underscored the island’s proximity to the conflict in the Middle East – though the Republic of Cyprus has insisted it is not involved in the war. New deployments by Türkiye in the north and Greece in the south, as well as by French and British forces on and around the island in the wake of the U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran, have also raised concerns about the effects of a military build-up on Cyprus, which has been divided for the past 52 years. 
A decade of intercommunal violence culminated in the island’s partition in 1974, when Türkiye intervened to split off part of its north after a coup backed by Greece. Since then, a UN-patrolled buffer zone has separated this area, administered by Turkish Cypriots, from the southern part, which is under the control of the Greek Cypriot-run Republic of Cyprus government. New leaders of the Turkish Cypriot north, elected in October 2025, are more inclined than their predecessors to re-engage in UN-led negotiations, and initial leader-level contacts have resumed under UN auspices. But these remain focused exclusively on confidence-building measures, with neither of the two parties to the conflict yet ready to agree on the terms of more comprehensive negotiations.

At the same time, growing European interest in strengthening security cooperation with Türkiye, a NATO member, since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has increased the importance for Europe of resolving the Cyprus issue, which has long been an irritant in EU-Türkiye relations. Political conditions in the region, however, complicate the prospects of a reset in ties between the two. In particular, the deepening strategic alignment and energy and defence cooperation among the Republic of Cyprus, Greece and Israel is not to Ankara’s liking.
A comprehensive settlement between the island’s Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot communities has long been elusive. Yet as new developments unfold, they once again draw attention to a dispute that has left its imprint on the island in a multitude of visible or less conspicuous ways, whether these be in Cypriots’ everyday habits or in the physical traces that have been left behind by decades of separation, displacement, property disputes and military deployment. This photo essay offers glimpses of how the island’s enduring divide resurfaces in landscapes, daily routines and limited forms of contact between the sides. As Crisis Group has argued elsewhere, until a broader settlement comes into view, arrangements that improve trade, travel, environmental management and other forms of cooperation may serve at the very least to ease tensions and generate tangible benefits for both sides.

The abandoned Nicosia International Airport, inside the UN buffer zone, is a powerful symbol of the dispute’s effect on the island. No civilian flight has taken off from the airport since 1974. Since then, the buffer zone – also known as the Green Line – has divided the island.

Today, the terminal remains closed to travellers, but its check-in counters and signboards remain intact. The UN Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus (UNFICYP) is headquartered nearby at Blue Beret Camp. 

UNFICYP has been deployed on the island since 1964. Its mandate, now renewed once a year by the Security Council, is to prevent military incidents or escalation, as well as to maintain conditions conducive to a political process, which the UN Good Offices Mission facilitates.
The buffer zone that UNFICYP patrols cuts through the countryside as well as the centre of Nicosia, which both sides claim as their capital. Within the city, it divides residential neighbourhoods and former commercial areas. Entry is limited to authorised personnel.

The Turkish Cypriot side does not fully recognise UNFICYP’s legitimacy because its mandate is based on a Status of Forces Agreement signed only with the Republic of Cyprus. It says the UN peacekeeping mission does not have the consent of all parties.

In recent years, financial pressures on UN peacekeeping have led to a reduction in UNFICYP’s budget and staff.

Ledra Street was the capital’s main commercial thoroughfare before it was cut in half in 1974. A crossing opened in 2008, five years after the first checkpoint was inaugurated at Nicosia’s Ledra Palace in 2003 – a landmark event for the island. After almost three decades of near-total separation, Greek and Turkish Cypriots were able to visit old family homes, reunite with former neighbours and friends, and see for themselves how the intervening years had reshaped the communities on the other side.

Over time, more crossings were opened: today, there are nine in total. But the facilities have not kept pace with demand. Crossings that allow vehicular traffic, particularly in and around Nicosia, frequently suffer from congestion, disrupting daily life for those who rely on them for commuting to work or school or for family or business reasons.

For over a year, the two sides have been discussing opening more crossings, but reaching an agreement on locations has been hard. Moreover, increased contact across the divide has not necessarily translated into greater willingness to compromise on core political demands or sovereignty claims.

Erdoğan is originally from Mansoura/Mansur, a village in western Cyprus close to the Mediterranean. In 1964, following attacks on Turkish Cypriots, his family fled to Kokkina/Erenköy, a small coastal enclave supplied from Türkiye by sea. After 1974, he was resettled in the Karpaz peninsula in a property abandoned by displaced Greek Cypriots.

Displacement is a defining legacy of the Cyprus conflict. Between 1963 and 1975, roughly 210,000 people were displaced on an island of about 570,000 inhabitants, of whom around 450,000-460,000 (78-80 per cent) were Greek Cypriots and about 100,000-105,000, including Erdoğan, were Turkish Cypriots. Following Türkiye’s 1974 military intervention, approximately 165,000 Greek Cypriots fled from the north to the south, while 40,000-50,000 Turkish Cypriots relocated to the north.

Before 1974, nearly all the private property in the fenced-off quarter of Varosha/Maraş, spanning about 6.2 sq km and with 3km of shoreline, belonged to Greek Cypriots. With more than 100 hotels, over 4,000 homes and hundreds of shops, offices, public buildings, schools, churches and other facilities, it was one of the Mediterranean’s most densely populated resort districts and the island’s premier tourist destination.

The area remains uninhabited, with authorities keeping it under military jurisdiction as a bargaining chip in future negotiations. Since 2020, however, the Turkish Cypriot administration – in tandem with Ankara – has opened parts of the zone to civilian visits and encouraged Greek Cypriots who owned property there to seek restitution. Several hundred Greek Cypriots have filed claims, but only a very small number have been resolved. The idea of restitution is controversial among Greek Cypriots, who want the entire area to be either returned to Greek Cypriot control as part of a comprehensive settlement or placed under UN administration, in line with Security Council resolutions. Under the Annan Plan – an initiative led by former Secretary-General Kofi Annan – this part of Varosha would have been returned to Greek Cypriot control under the aegis of a reunified Cyprus. But the plan failed in a 2004 referendum after Greek Cypriot voters rejected reunification, despite Turkish Cypriot support. 

Across the Cyprus landscape, relics tell the story of the conflict. Memorials to those who were killed dot the island, both in cities and the countryside. These sites tell stories of loss and sacrifice, albeit selective ones. At the same time, disused houses of worship, whether mosques in the south or churches in the north, stand as reminders of how communities used to live together and how mass displacement tore them asunder.

The economy of the Turkish Cypriot north is weighed down by its lack of international recognition and access to global markets. Public finances, infrastructure investment and large parts of the private sector depend on public funds from Ankara and trade links with Türkiye. The use of the Turkish lira further exposes the north to economic volatility linked to Türkiye’s macro-economic ailments, including inflation and regular currency depreciation. Uncertainty linked to longstanding property disputes also deters investment, while a large public sector makes for persistent pressure on state coffers.

Meanwhile, tourism has become a pillar of the northern economy, with over ten flights coming in from Türkiye per day. Development, largely driven by Turkish investors, has focused on coastal areas and large-scale resort and casino projects. 

October 2025 elections in the north brought an unexpected change of leadership, with the right-wing nationalist incumbent Ersin Tatar losing in a landslide to his left-centre rival Tufan Erhurman, who had expressed a greater inclination toward renewed engagement with the Greek Cypriot side.

Meanwhile, Greek Cypriot politics have shifted rightward in recent years and become increasingly fragmented, expanding the leverage of right-wing and far-right parties. 

President Nikos Christodoulides, elected in 2023, governs without a formal coalition and relies on a fluid parliamentary majority, drawing primarily on centrist and centre-right parties. 

While these parties do not form a cohesive bloc, they tend to favour a more hardline approach to the island’s politics, resisting concessions on core issues such as sovereignty, governance and security. Hence there is a tension at the height of power: Christodoulides needs to present himself as supportive of a settlement process, but the parties he depends on are often reluctant to back meaningful compromise.

Meanwhile, the two parties most traditionally associated with support for a settlement, AKEL on the left and DISY on the centre right, have both seen their electoral strength steadily erode in recent years. 

The surge in popularity of the National Popular Front, founded in 2008 as an ideological offshoot of Greece’s Golden Dawn, has reinforced this rightward drift. 

In late 2025, this Front used negotiations over the Republic of Cyprus’s budget to push for removing spending on new crossings and bicommunal initiatives. Though its plans were not adopted in full, these proposals reflected a political trend that risks further constricting the already limited space for compromise on the Greek Cypriot side.

The 6th-century church of Panayia Kanakariahoused some of the few surviving examples of early Christian mosaic art in the world. In the years following the island’s division, the mosaics were stripped from the walls and sold on the international antiquities market. Most have been recovered through lengthy legal battles.

Yasin and Abdullah are restoration workers at Panayia Kanakaria. On the site, Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot technicians have worked side by side to conserve the structure. The restoration, completed in 2025, was carried out under the bicommunal Technical Committee on Cultural Heritage.

The restoration at Panayia Kanakaria is an example of what are known as confidence-building measures – practical steps to improve daily life and maintain dialogue without resolving sovereignty disputes. Since 2008, bicommunal technical committees – currently numbering thirteen – have delivered results in areas including cultural heritage, biodiversity, police cooperation, peace education and mobile connectivity. These initiatives help maintain dialogue and cooperation at a time when formal negotiations are stalled, even if reaching agreements can be arduous. 

On the Karpaz peninsula, donkeys roam freely along coastal roads and paths leading to the Apostolos Andreas Monastery. These animals are descendants of livestock abandoned in 1974, when Greek Cypriot villagers fled the advancing Turkish forces.

In 2008, the donkeys became an unlikely point of connection across the divide, when growing concern about their welfare prompted parallel campaigns among both Greek and Turkish Cypriots to protect them from neglect. This episode shows that collaboration at the civil society level is possible even when a political settlement remains out of reach.

Cyprus has returned to the international agenda, not because reunification appears imminent, but because the strategic environment around the island has shifted, making Cyprus more relevant amid regional war and renewed European interest in cooperation with Türkiye. While the political space for compromise remains narrow, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots still cross the Green Line daily and find common ground on practical matters.

All photos by Jorge Gutiérrez Lucena