The issue of missing persons in Cyprus is a European issue and the EU could make resolving it a condition for continuing its financial support to Turkey, European Parliament rapporteur François Xavier Bellamy said on Tuesday in Brussels.

The committee on civil liberties, justice and home affairs (LIBE) discussed the issue of missing persons in Cyprus, following a proposal by Cypriot MEP Loukas Fourlas and Bellamy.

Relatives of missing persons from both communities, Harita Mandoles and Erbay Akansoy, spoke their experiences, in what Fourlas described as a “historic moment”.

“It was perhaps the first time that relatives of missing Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots appeared before an EU institution to tell their stories, share their pain with us and hold us accountable for our responsibilities,” Fourlas told a press conference after the debate.

Bellamy said that 2,001 Cypriots have been reported missing since the Turkish invasion, 1,508 Greek Cypriots and over 400 Turkish Cypriots, while half are still missing.

He added that he would soon be visiting Cyprus.

“Cyprus needs justice, Cyprus needs peace, and for peace to be possible we need this truth […] and Turkey has an obligation to help find the truth,” he said.

He explained that Turkey is blocking access to areas designated as military zones and that the Turkish military is denying access to its archives and old maps to help clarify the fate of the missing.

Mandoles told the committee she lost her husband, her father, two sons-in-law, a cousin and her uncle.

She also described the events of July 20, 1974, when the Turks landed in Kyrenia, how they ran to protect themselves and their capture the next day.

“They were beating us, there were 48 of us, men, women and children,” she said. Some where shot and killed, including her husband.

Mandoles also spoke about the raping of the women. “The screams, the voices are in my ears, I can’t forget them.”

Akansoy said he was a second-generation relative of missing persons and that most of the people in his village were “massacred by the so-called nationalists” from a neighbouring village.

His father, 18 years old at the time, had been a prisoner of war and on his release learned that his mother, 36, his brothers, 12 and 11, and his sisters, 15 and six, “had all been tortured and killed”.

“The perpetrators of these atrocities still live among us,” he added.

Head of the Cyprus Settlement Support Unit Julia Bertezolo said the testimonies served as a reminder of how much damage the absence of dialogue and understanding can do, but also as a reminder of the importance of efforts for peace and reconciliation.

Bertezolo said that financial support to the Committee on Missing Persons (CMP) was “an emblematic programme” and that the EU, since 2006, had granted €41 million to the project, “which aims to close a painful chapter in Cyprus”.

Half of the missing persons have been found, half are still missing, she said.

On behalf of the European People’s Party, Fourlas said that no matter how many years passed, wounds did not heal and that the purpose of the discussion was “to give the truth a chance to come out”.

Socialist MEP Costas Mavridis said Turkey had been condemned by EU courts regarding the issue of missing persons, while MEP Geadis Geadis said Turkey should not join the EU unless it pointed to where the missing persons were.

MEP George Georgiou, on behalf of the Left group, said that for “the missing, the raped women, whether they are Turkish Cypriots or Greek Cypriots, the pain is the same”.

Bellamy said “we must make this a European issue and […] it is of the utmost importance to put it at the top of the agenda of the European Commission and the European Council.”

Solving the issue of missing persons “must be a precondition in negotiations for Turkey’s accession to the EU”.

He also said that the EU gives billions of euros every year to Turkey and wondered the EU did not make the resolution of this issue a condition for continuing its support.