Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar on Friday decried the “unpunished murders” of the Turkish Cypriot residents of the village of Tochni, at a service held to mark the 51st anniversary of the massacre of the village carried out by Greek Cypriot paramilitary group Eoka B.

The Tochni massacre was one of the starkest scenes of brutality during Cyprus’ intercommunal struggle, with Turkish Cypriot men and boys from the village being rounded up and shot dead with automatic rifles on August 14, 1974, amid the second wave of Turkey’s invasion of the north of the island.

The men and boys, alongside inhabitants of the nearby villages of Mari and Zygi, were taken to Palodia, where they were lined up and shot, before being buried in a makeshift mass grave. In total, 84 people were killed.

“These murders have gone down in history as unpunished murders because the Greek Cypriot administration took no action to punish the murderers. This is their shame. What happened here was barbarous and a crime against humanity, the likes of which has been experienced in very few places in the world,” Tatar said on Friday.

With this in mind, he stressed that any agreement to resolve the Cyprus problem must entail a permanent presence of Turkish troops.

“If there is to be an agreement, our red lines are absolutely that there be cooperation between two states, and that there be a continuation of our motherland, Turkey’s, status as a guarantor power and the presence of Turkish troops on the island as a deterrent force,” he said.

Erdinc Erdagli, the chairman of the Tochni martyrs’ families’ association, also spoke at the service, and recounted the events of the massacre as he saw them.

“We were experiencing great joy of gaining freedom on the one hand, and the deep pain of losing loved ones on the other,” he said, referring to Turkey’s invasion of the island.

“They put the captured people on buses, the first group of 45 people at around 10am, and the second group of 38 people at around 2pm, and they took them away amidst the helpless gazes of their families. That was the last time we saw them,” he said.

Former foreign minister Erato Kozakou-Markoullis publicly apologised to the Turkish Cypriot community for the massacre in 2016, following the funeral of 33 Turkish Cypriot Tochni residents whose remains had been identified by the Committee on Missing Persons.

“I feel the need to express a sincere public apology to our Turkish Cypriot compatriots for the horrific crimes committed on August 14, 1974 by Eoka B extremists against 126 women and children in the villages of Aloa, Maratha and Sandalaris, and 85 civilian men, including a boy of 12 years from the village of Tochni,” Markoullis said.

Markoullis faced backlash for her apology but defended her statement to the Cyprus Mail shortly afterwards.

“I have always felt this way. Today I have the ability, now that I am fully independent, to express my opinion,” she told the Cyprus Mail.