Cyprus exclusion zone. Varosha. Has the ghost town lifted the curtain?! What is the future of Varosha

Varosha is a district of the city of Famagusta. In the sixties and seventies it was the most popular resort in Cyprus and one of the most popular holiday destinations in the entire Mediterranean. The 4-kilometer-long beach was built up with brand new hotels, the most luxurious and modern at that time. There were nightclubs, shops, markets, expensive private villas.

But the year 1974 came, a military coup took place in Cyprus, carried out by Greek nationalists dreaming of reunification with the metropolis, in response to which the Turkish army landed on the island and occupied its northeastern part. In particular, Varosha came under Turkish occupation. The Greek population left the area in a hurry, leaving inside things, furniture, everything they had acquired through back-breaking labor. Then it seemed to them that they would return here in a few days. But 37 years have passed, and the city remains empty.

The Turkish army cordoned it off, surrounded it with a fence and installed observation points along the perimeter. In addition, there are UN posts inside. In general, hundreds of people, for some unknown reason, are guarding an absolutely empty city.

Recently, plans have emerged to transfer Varosha to the Greek side to revive a world-class resort here, with the condition that the majority of jobs there will go to Turkish Cypriots. However, for now these are just plans, and it is unknown when their implementation will begin.
And now there is one hotel operating inside this area. It houses a rest home for officers of the Turkish army.

There are stories on the Internet that life in Varosha froze in 1974, that in hotel rooms and private houses there there is still furniture, shops are full of goods, and on the tables there are plates of food left by Greeks fleeing in panic during war.
But this is all completely untrue. Or rather, all this was true, but in 1977, 3 years after the Turkish invasion, when the Swedish journalist Jan Olaf Bengtson visited Varosha, the words from whose article are still quoted on many websites and in many reports.
But for more than thirty years everything has changed a lot. Now Varosha is completely deserted. Everything that could be taken out of there was taken out. Moreover, both the Turkish military and the former Greek population of the area (few people know, but former residents are allowed to visit inside from time to time).

It must be said that the ghost town of Varosha is not limited to a fence with warning signs on it. Houses abandoned in 1974 are discovered just as you approach it; they surround the area, like satellites surround the planet. Moreover, it is completely unclear why one house is abandoned and the other is not. It’s not just a matter of property rights (the Turkish population carried out many squatters of residential and administrative buildings in 1974).

Detached abandoned office building

Most of the surroundings of Varosha look very unpresentable. However, it also happens the other way around. For example, we came to the fence of this area along a busy city street with administrative and office buildings on it. We walked and walked and suddenly noticed that behind the roundabout ahead we could already see houses with empty windows and a fence.

And this is not easy to do! The fence is very winding. Sometimes it goes around buildings and entire blocks of residential buildings, sinking its teeth into the body of a dead city.
Since 1974, two generations of people have grown up here for whom this state of affairs is commonplace, who are accustomed to not looking at the other side of the fence at all, ignoring the existence of the dead Siamese twin of their native Famagusta. Therefore, our appearance on these not at all tourist streets is of interest. True, silent. People stealthily stare in our direction, trying not to reveal their curiosity, and shrug their shoulders, completely not understanding what we forgot here.

I have already said: everything that could be taken out of the region was taken out. But the same cannot be said about the surrounding areas. Here the streets are full of half-rotten cars that last moved in the notorious year 1974. And in one of the alleys we were lucky enough to find several boxes with empty bottles of foreign soda, standing in place for 37 years.

Some collectors would bite their own hands off for this treasure, but here no one cares about them. The bottles had long since filled with rainwater. And some drinks, the labels of which are pasted on the container, no longer exist at all!

What a flimsy fence. – Storm tells me. - You can safely jump over.

But there was no need to jump. In one of the dead ends, near some warehouses, I find a decent-sized gap between the fence bars.
- Let's climb! – I offer it to Storm and Fomka, but for some reason they refuse.
OK! I take off my bag and climb into the gap myself.
From this gap, a barely noticeable path goes deeper into the block.
In general, there are several photos and video reports on the Internet from stalkers who managed to walk along the streets of Varosha. Apparently, I discovered just one of the entrances inside that they use.
I’m afraid to go further on my own, I don’t know the rules of conduct here, or the safe paths, I don’t know anything at all. So I take a photo as a souvenir and return to the mainland.

Mission accomplished! I was in Varosha!

For a note. Fortunately, I did not dare to go further. Upon arrival, I found the place of my penetration into Varosha on Google Earth and discovered that a hundred meters from “my” hole in the fence was the main entrance to this ghost town. And there are armed soldiers. I wish I could run into them! It would be funny...

In about ten minutes we will go out along the city street just in time for this post. I will go straight to the dugouts with soldiers armed with machine guns, we will make eye contact, I will look for a minute at the street, blocked by a barrier, going into the area, then I will turn around and walk further along the fence.

In another five minutes we will reach the central stadium of Famagusta, located at the very outskirts of the dead city.

The cathedral in the background, despite its good appearance, is already located in a fenced area

We pass through the stadium and find ourselves in line of sight from the famous Palm Beach. From here you can already see three high-rise buildings near the seashore, which were once hotels, and are now the “calling card” of Varosha. Their image is reproduced in all articles dedicated to this amazing place.

The Palm Beach Hotel itself is currently under renovation. However, the beach at its foot is quite accessible to visitors. There are modern sunbeds, showers, changing rooms, and a cafe. And all this is right next to the fence, behind which there are empty hotels.

But first we go not to the beach itself, but to an old dilapidated pier protruding from it into the sea.
There are already about a dozen people on the pier. Mainly locals. They all take pictures against the backdrop of the sea. We don’t give a damn about the sea for now. We take pictures against the backdrop of abandoned hotels lined up along the shore receding into the distance.

Wow! – Storm says, seeing the panorama that opened from the pier. All he knew about Varosha was that this area existed. And our walks along the fence with one or two-story houses on the other side did not inspire him much. And here is such a spectacle!

We go down from the pier to the beach. It's time to swim in the sea again. Moreover, there is such beauty around!

On the beach, I can hear Russian speech out of my ear. Judging by the accent, Moscow. I approach them, say hello, and ask if they paid for the sunbed, and, if so, how much.
- Two euros. - Muscovites answer. It is now clear how much money is used to support the infrastructure on the beach.
No! No sunbeds! Let's settle down on the sand.
Oh, what sand there is! Small, clean, pleasant to the touch. Now it’s clear why this resort was so popular in its time. With such wonderful sand! I read on the Internet that the sand here is one of the best on the entire Mediterranean coast.

After swimming, I walk along the shore all the way to the fence that blocks the beach perpendicular to the water and separates the living city from the dead. Above this fence rises a guard post of the Turkish army.

I look at the destroyed buildings on the other side of the fence, the washed-out beach and shore, and glance at the booth, wondering if anyone is watching me now. It seems like no one.
But this serene silence stops when two Czech guys approach the fence and try to take a couple of pictures.
- Don't take pictures! – A man in military uniform suddenly appeared in the window of the observation post shouts. The Czechs dismount and quickly leave.
- Why not take pictures? - I'm interfering. – The Internet is full of photographs of Varosha.
- Then why do you need another one? – The soldier calmly counters me.

I'm going back to my friends. We bask in the rays of the setting sun for some time, take pictures against the backdrop of dead hotel buildings, then get ready and go see the Old Town of Famagusta while it is still light. Yesterday we failed to do this!

Until the 70s of the twentieth century, Varosha was a resort town, where thousands of tourists came from all over Europe. Varosha hotels were so famous that the most luxurious rooms were booked by far-sighted Germans and British 15 years in advance. Due to the fact that there were more and more tourists, a huge number of hotels and entertainment centers, nightclubs, and bars were built in the city.

It was a cozy seaside place with beautiful hotels located along the coast, with clubs and churches, private villas and panel houses, with hospitals, kindergartens and schools, gas stations of the Greek oil monopolist of that time, Petrolina.

The new quarter of the city of Famagusta covered an area of tens of square kilometers to the south, along the eastern coast of Cyprus.

Now this area looks depressing - an abandoned church overgrown with weeds and thistles, dilapidated villas and houses. The only living creatures living in Varosha are rodents, wild cats and seagulls. Sometimes, in the silence of abandoned streets, you can hear the footsteps of Turkish army soldiers and UN peacekeepers. Several kilometers of golden beaches remain unnecessary to anyone for about forty years.

A row of bank buildings, hotels, closed with padlocks, a frozen crane, neon signs that can hardly be seen through the weeds and cacti. Villas and houses that have been looted many times...

In 1974, a coup d'état took place in Cyprus, the purpose of which was to subjugate the island to the dictatorship of the “black” colonels, and after a short period of time Turkey annexed the territory. On August 15, 1974, the Turks occupied 37% of the island, including the city of Famagusta and its suburb of Varosha. From that moment on, the island was divided into two parts: Turkish and Greek. Shortly before the arrival of the Turkish army in Famagusta, all the Greeks of the Varosha suburb left their apartments to find refuge in the southern part of Cyprus, the USA and England. About 20 thousand residents, leaving their homes, were sure that they would definitely return home in a week, or at most a month. Forty years have passed since that time, and the indigenous people have not been able to return home.

The Turks living in Famagusta did not begin to populate Varosha, unlike most places on the island, where the abandoned houses of the Greeks were seized by migrants from Turkey (the local population nicknamed them Anatolian settlers). The orphaned village was surrounded by barbed wire, checkpoints and other barriers, as if the suburb was “frozen” in the same form in which the local Greeks left it in August 1974. In this form, the suburb has survived to this day - such an ominous evidence of the civil war that once divided friendly Cyprus into two unequal ethnic parts.

Years pass, and the Greek Cypriots still hope to return home, however, a compromise has not been found that would suit both sides. Varosha became a bargaining chip in relations between Turkish Cypriots and Greek Cypriots. Varosha became a sad symbol of the division of the island - a “ghost” town.

Those who were able to climb through the barbed wire once erected by the Turks speak of laundry hanging on lines to dry, of dried food on plates left in the dining rooms of fashionable houses and villas, of an unimaginable amount of weeds on the orphaned streets of Varosha. Price tags in store windows installed in 1974.

Varosha was completely plundered. They carried everything that could be carried. First, the Turkish military took valuables and furniture to the mainland, then residents of nearby areas took everything that was not useful to the officers and soldiers of the occupying army.

The Turkish authorities were forced to declare the suburb a closed zone, although this did not save it from complete plunder.

However, there is an alternative solution to this conflict, which was provoked and organized by the British in order to prevent “Soviet” influence in the Middle East and in particular in Cyprus. Makarios was going to ask (or asked?) from the British that they remove their bases from the island, for which he paid with his life.

The “Turkish occupation” in fact is the deployment of troops of another NATO country to the island, where another territory is being formed that is independent of the government of Cyprus, and is even aggressive towards it. It is easier for the West to control strategically important territory if it is divided.

In the 1970s, Famagusta was the main tourist center in Cyprus. Due to the growing number of tourists in the city, many new hotels and tourist facilities were built, and especially many of them appeared in Varosha. Between 1970 and 1974, the city was at the peak of its popularity and enjoyed the recognition of many famous people of the time. Among the stars who visited him were Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Raquel Welch and Brigitte Bardot. Varosha housed many modern hotels, and its streets were home to a large number of entertainment venues, bars, restaurants and nightclubs.

On July 20, 1974, the Turkish army invaded Cyprus in response to the political upheaval in the country, and on August 15 of the same year, the Turks occupied Famagusta. Since then, Varosha has been fenced off, looted, and getting there is almost impossible.

The closed quarter is surrounded by legends. There are a lot of beautiful stories on the Internet that inside there are shops filled with clothes that were fashionable 38 years ago, and empty but fully equipped hotels. In fact, the quarter was plundered in the first years after its closure, and now there are not even any window frames left there, not to mention clothes and cars. Varosha has long been the most impressive symbol of the island's division, haunted by the ghosts of the past.

01. Summer 1974. Varosha is a lively seaside city, where foreigners from all over Europe flocked in the hundreds. They say that Varosha hotels were so popular that the most fashionable rooms in them were reserved by prudent British and Germans for 20 years in advance.

02. The cream of Cypriot society lived here or came on vacation from business Nicosia. Luxurious villas and hotels, advanced by the standards of the 70s of the last century, were built here. New Famagusta, as Varosha was sometimes called, stretched south from the ancient fortress walls along the eastern coast for several kilometers...

03. Advertising postcard of those years... In mid-August 1974, Turkish troops landed in the north of Cyprus. On August 14-16, 1974, the Turkish army occupied 37% of the island, including Famagusta and one of its suburbs, Varosha. Residents of the fashionable suburb of Famagusta - and most of them were Greek Cypriots - were forced to leave their homes overnight. 16 thousand people left in full confidence that they would return in a week, maximum two.

04. 32 years have passed since then, and they never had the opportunity to enter their homes.

05. The Greeks can observe the dead city through a telescope. This is how it looks from the Greek part of Cyprus.

06. The Turks are allowing us closer to the city. The inhabitants of Varosha currently include seagulls, rodents and stray cats. Four kilometers of golden sand beaches have remained unclaimed for more than three decades. At night, only floodlights are lit at Turkish military posts.

07. Varosha was subjected to total plunder by marauders. At first it was the Turkish military, who took furniture, televisions and dishes to the mainland. Then the residents of nearby streets, who carried away everything that the soldiers and officers of the occupying army did not need. Turkey was forced to declare the city a closed zone, but this did not save it from total looting: everything that could be carried away was taken away.

08. One of the residents of Varosha, forced to leave the city in the summer of 1974, identified her radio... in Greece. The woman recognized him by his characteristic scratch and her initials. When asked where the new owners got it from, they explained that they bought it for almost nothing at one of the Istanbul markets.

09. Apparently, everything was taken out, even the window frames.

10. The Turkish version of the name Varosha is Marash

11. In 1974, there were 109 hotels in Famagusta with 11 thousand beds. Some of the hotel complexes in Varosha are still legally the private property of citizens from 20 countries. One of the hotels in Varosha was put into operation three days before the city was abandoned by its inhabitants.

12. According to the Cypriot economist Costas Apostilidis, real estate in Varosha (hotels, villas, land) can be valued at 2 billion pounds

13. Residents of Varosha were forced to leave the city within 24 hours. The Turks allowed them to take with them only what they could carry.

14. In February 1997, the government of the unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, as a sign of protest against the intention of the Republic of Cyprus to buy Russian-made anti-missile systems, threatened to populate the abandoned Varosha with settlers from mainland Turkey.

15. In 1999, the leader of the Turkish Cypriot community, Rauf Denktash, offered hotels and houses in Varosha to refugees from Kosovo as temporary housing. The Republic of Cyprus protested. According to the UN Security Council resolution of 1984, Varosha can only be inhabited by its indigenous inhabitants (or their descendants), the vast majority of whom are Greek Cypriots.

16. Varosha has never been part of the self-proclaimed Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. And although it is considered neutral territory, the Turks refused to transfer the empty city to the full control of UN peacekeeping forces.

17. Turkish post on the border with Varosha. The soldier carefully monitors that no one climbs over the fence. They say that if caught in a closed area, the fine will be 500 euros.

18. Although the fence can be easily climbed, which many people do.

19. border.

20. Fence on the beach. On one side tourists swim and sunbathe, on the other there are 40 years of silence.

21. The hotels on the left are abandoned, and the blue one on the right is operational. I lived in it. Excellent hotel.

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25. In photographs on the Internet you can see what is happening in abandoned houses. Unfortunately, I myself did not dare to go far, since there were only a few hours before the plane and there was no risk.

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27. Abandoned church.

28. On one side of the barbed wire fence are Turkish Cypriot houses and cars parked along the sidewalks, on the other side there is a rusty fence, behind which crumbling buildings are visible. It is quite obvious that the fence did not become an obstacle for those who wanted to enter the dead city.

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33. They say there are a lot of old cars left in the city. This is most likely true.

34. They also stand on the border.

35. Some Turks pull it out of the closed area and restore it.

36. Old gas station.

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38. Tractor.

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Every few years, hope for the return of the city to its inhabitants revived, but the parties have still not come to a compromise that would suit both communities. Varosha has become a bargaining chip in relations between Greek and Turkish Cypriots. Recently, the leader of the Turkish Cypriots proposed returning Varosha. Then the Greek Cypriots did not agree. Now they are ready to take Varosha, but the Turkish Cypriots demand, in exchange for the ghost town, permission to conduct direct trade with all EU member countries.

During his first press conference, the leader of the Turkish Cypriot community, Mehmet Ali Talat, told reporters that he was ready to return Varosha in exchange for lifting the embargo from the northern territories. However, this proposal was rejected. Talat proposed returning the ghost town to the control of the Greek Cypriots, subject to the opening of the sea and air borders of the unrecognized international community of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.

Other posts about Cyprus:

Varosha - until the 70s, a lively seaside city, where hundreds of tourists flocked from all over Europe. They say that Varosha hotels were so popular that the most fashionable rooms in them were reserved by prudent British and Germans for 20 years in advance. Luxurious villas and hotels, advanced by the standards of the 70s of the last century, were built here.

In 1974, Greek fascists attempted a coup d'état (the goal was to subjugate Cyprus to the dictatorship of the Athenian black colonels), and Turkey was forced to send in troops. On August 14-16, 1974, the Turkish army occupied 37% of the island, including Famagusta and one of its suburbs, Varosha. A few hours before the Turkish troops arrived in Famagusta, all the Greek residents of Varosha left their homes to become refugees in the southern part of the island, in mainland Greece, Great Britain and the United States. 16 thousand people left in full confidence that they would return in a week, maximum two. More than 30 years have passed since then, and they have never had the opportunity to enter their homes.

Only Turkish troops and UN personnel are allowed to remain in the buffer zone. The intruder may be shot.

Dilapidated hotel

An inscription warning about a minefield.

Varosha is a modern Pompeii stuck in time in 1974.

An abandoned church behind a fence.

Former luxury hotel.

Between 1970 and 1974, the city was one of the most popular tourist resorts in the world, and was a favorite holiday destination of the rich and famous, with stars such as Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, Raquel Welch and Brigitte Bardot.