Last week, Cyprus became the 188th member of the International Federation of Red Cross (IFRC) after being admitted officially as a National Society. But it was a long and arduous journey for the country that has – since the foreign invasion of 1974 – faced hardships and adversity. In spite of this, Cyprus Red Cross has shown a united and determined face.
Members of the Cyprus Red Cross converged on Sydney last week to take part in their first Statutory Meetings of the International Red Cross Red Crescent Movement.
Leda Koursoumba, first vice president of Cyprus Red Cross, along with four other Cypriot delegates attended the meetings, including: Fotini Papadopoulou, president; Demetrios Neophytou, director general; Dr Mustafa Hami, second vice president; and Vanessa Kyprianou, president of youth. The Cypriot delegation along with over 1000 other Red Cross Red Crescent delegates from all over the world met for high level talks and forums to help set the global agenda for future humanitarian action. For Cyprus this is a “very important and good step forward”, says Ms Koursoumba.
“There is only one National Society,” Ms Koursoumba tells Neos Kosmos, “and the Cyprus Red Cross society is open to everybody on the island.”
Cyprus Red Cross was founded in 1950 as a branch of the British Red Cross. Following the establishment of the Republic of Cyprus and the accession of Cyprus to the Geneva Conventions, the Cyprus Red Cross was registered. Since its inception, it has been open to all Cypriots that live on the island including Greeks, Turks, Armenians, Maronites, Latins, English and foreigners living in Cyprus.
Yet, with the Turkish invasion in 1974, and the unexpected horrors of war, the people of the Cyprus Red Cross were faced with a challenge they never could have imagined. With military involvement felt in Cyprus for the first time, panic and chaos prevailed; fear was widespread. Cypriots in droves fled to the mountains in search of safety.
And, although the first Turkish mortar on 20 July 1974 flattened the Cyprus Red Cross headquarters, it did not scare away its volunteers there. They reacted immediately and efficiently, responding to the call of necessity from the first moment, they were on the line of duty. They worked in the hospitals and helped in their evacuation when this became necessary, they took part in the transportation and treatment of the wounded, distributed food and clothing, set up tents for the homeless and evacuated old or sick people who were stranded or isolated in the hostility areas. Even at the most critical hours of the conflict, in the almost deserted cities that were being bombed by the Turkish air force and artillery and when most of the services had been disrupted, the Cyprus Red Cross kept working. And it was working impartially. It provided its services to both Greek and Turk, to the wounded and disabled without any bias or discrimination. For the Cyprus Red Cross – as for the International Red Cross – man has no passport; they are simply people.
“People were internally displaced with the foreign invasion of 1974 – and some still are and have never returned to their home,” Ms Koursoumba tells Neos Kosmos.
At some point the hostilities ceased. but the most difficult task for the Red Cross had just begun. In a small country with 200,000 refugees, 55,000 broken households, a very large number of missing persons, cut off from their community and relatives, the Cyprus Red Cross kept up its work with the same dedication. It helped in the reuniting of families, the passing of messages in an effort to trace the missing, and also cared for refugees. It was a multifaceted and arduous activity – an activity that continues now and will continue for as long as there are still refugees and missing.
Besides the Cyprus Red Cross, the International Red Cross also came to the rescue. But before an International Red Cross crew set itself up on Cyprus soil, the Cyprus Red Cross had already formed the nucleus of the service for establishing contact between relatives and begun to collect the first information on the missing. While the war wounds had not yet begun to heal and Red Cross activity was continuing on all levels, the return of the prisoners began.
The Turkish invasion of 1974, and the subsequent disunity, was one of the hardships faced by Cyprus Red Cross in being recognised by the IFRC as a National Society. In 2004 – following Cyprus’ introduction to the European Union – Ms Koursoumba and the team went about changing this.
“It was a long process which was upsetting for us,” explains Ms Koursoumba, “but then finally in February 2012 we were officially recognised, and then [last Tuesday] we were finally admitted, which is very exciting for us.”
“We always felt it was unfair for our national society not to be recognised, even though it was recognised by all and accepted by all that we were a well-functioning society, catering for all Cypriots and not only immigrants,” she says, adding that they are there for international appeals as well.
“When there is an international disaster and there is an appeal by the IFRC we respond to that,” says Ms Koursoumba, “usually with money but there have been instances where we are allowed to go and help.”
When asked about the challenges faced by modern day Cyprus, Ms Koursoumba says the crisis has affected the island the most. She says whereas in previous years, people in need from other countries were receiving food supplies, and only a small percentage of Cypriots were, now, it’s the Cypriot people that need assistance the most.
“The crisis has affected Cyprus tremendously,” she says.
“Families in Cyprus are in need of food and we are allocating a lot of our resources there and creating programs to help.”
One of the programs includes providing breakfast for children at schools, with the assistance of the minister of education, upon discovering that thousands of Cypriot children were going to school hungry.
Another significant contribution the Cyprus Red Cross made, as highlighted by Ms Koursoumba, was the medical and paramedical attention given to disabled and paralysed children. She says over thirty years ago, these children would be boarded out to the Red Cross Home; they would live there and be given board, lodging and schooling and all the medical support they needed, until they matured and moved on. Now, they have the ability and the help to stay with their families and – with changes to the education system – are being accepted and nurtured in mainstream schools.
But it’s the volunteers that make Cyprus Red Cross – and all universal members of the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement – the one contributing factor of their success.
“For us at the Cyprus Red Cross, we feel we owe a lot to the thousands of volunteers who have been assisting us, and we are investing in them for the future because young people are our future.”
As it stands, Ms Koursoumba estimates that there are more than 10,000 volunteers registered as part of the Cyprus Red Cross. But these are only registered numbers and she says Cypriots of all backgrounds are there to help in times of need. And they will continue to do this, as long as there are people on earth who need help.