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00:00 Well, what is it like to grow up in a city that's split between two governments?
00:03 It may sound like a thing of the past, but it's still reality for residents of one
00:07 European capital.
00:08 That's Nicosia in Cyprus.
00:10 It's the world's last divided capital city, split between the Christian, Orthodox, Greek,
00:15 and Muslim Turkish communities.
00:17 For their new YouTube documentary, France 24's Enter team met one Turkish and one Greek
00:21 Cypriot to learn what life is like on different sides of the border.
00:25 Eleanor Pompei, English reporter at Enter, worked on the piece and she joins me on set
00:30 now for more.
00:31 Hi there, Eleanor.
00:32 So, what did your reporting reveal?
00:33 What is life like in Nicosia today?
00:35 Well, so we went, a team of us went there and we met with a young Turkish Cypriot named
00:42 Sude from the north and someone from the south, Nymorestis, he's Greek.
00:46 And it's very complex yet fascinating reality that when you meet because within five meters,
00:52 it's a completely different world that you're entering.
00:54 In the very center of the city is the checkpoint.
00:57 So you have on one side mosques and kebabs and the Turkish lira and then on the other
01:02 you have Euros and Orthodox churches.
01:04 And so it truly is something that even superficially is very different.
01:08 And the one thing that is the same is kind of the British influence that persists on
01:12 both sides of the city.
01:14 But yes, it is just, it's a completely different reality than when you encounter and the one
01:20 that they live in 10 meters away from each other.
01:24 Can you explain then what the political situation looks like?
01:27 Well, let's say that formally the Euro, the entire island is the Republic of Cyprus.
01:34 Then the north has been occupied since 74 by Turkey.
01:38 So it's called the TRNC, the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.
01:42 And then you have two British sovereign bases, a kind of like military bases, but of British
01:46 sovereignty fully.
01:48 And then you have the United Nations peacekeeping forces that patrol a very big chunk of the
01:54 country, which is an entire, it's kind of a buffer zone, a ceasefire line that runs
01:58 through the width of the country and that divides Cyprus and Nicosia in two.
02:03 And it's very difficult to access.
02:07 We had a huge chance of doing that.
02:09 So I think it's interesting to watch for that as well, because neither Turkish Cypriots
02:13 nor Greek Cypriots have allowed in.
02:14 And we managed to do that for a few minutes.
02:16 So that was very interesting too.
02:18 So in the first question, when you describe life in Nicosia, it does sound relatively
02:23 peaceful.
02:24 It sounds more or less like people can just get on with their daily lives.
02:28 But how are the communities working with this mixed heritage?
02:31 Is it all positive?
02:32 Well, it depends who you ask.
02:35 Of course, I would say that what we encountered for sure is that the youngest generation definitely
02:40 is peace oriented.
02:42 When we asked them both through the anorestas what their dream for the country is, they
02:47 both answered unity and peace.
02:50 And now that may be something isn't the same for all generations.
02:52 Their grandparents one used to live in harmony and peace.
02:57 It's kind of their parents generation that lived through the war and that lived in a
03:01 country that was divided already.
03:03 The younger generation was relatively lucky in the sense that they got to experience very
03:08 early on the opening of the borders in 2003.
03:11 And so they've known a relatively open city.
03:16 But it is true that still to this day, it's very hard to encounter, for example, a mixed
03:20 group of friends, whether they are both Turkish and Greek Cypriots.
03:23 What everyone kept saying to us, however, is that it is not really an ethnic problem
03:29 at all.
03:30 It has a lot to do with foreign powers and foreign interests.
03:33 But the people of Cyprus are very peace oriented.
03:37 So you kind of answered this more or less already, but just to expand upon it a little
03:43 bit, the younger generation then appears to be more open and more tolerant.
03:46 But are there still ethnic divisions?
03:48 Well, yes.
03:49 So not really.
03:50 Then again, there is an issue, which is that it is still very talked about the fact that
03:56 is it an occupation is not an occupation, the one that you have in the north.
04:00 And the Turkish Cypriots are going through something is also complicated on their side,
04:05 which is that Turkish citizens, which they call settlers, are overwhelmingly now more
04:10 numerous than the Cypriots.
04:12 So that is an issue for the entire country of Cyprus, but for Turkish Cypriots as well.
04:16 And the girl that we that we met, she's Turkish Cypriot, but she doesn't have a passport even,
04:21 meaning that she can't leave the country.
04:23 She is she she doesn't even feel that she belongs to that place despite being born there
04:30 and living her entire life there.
04:31 So it is very complex and it is something that they all hope that is going to resolve
04:37 sometime soon.
04:38 So we've just touched upon the basics of this conflict, Elena.
04:43 So where can we watch the documentary to go more in depth?
04:46 So it's on my YouTube channel.
04:48 You can enter English ENTR.
04:51 And it's part of a series that we do about growing up in Europe's contended territories.
04:55 So that is the first episode we put out.
04:57 But there's more.
04:58 So if you like that, watch the show as well.
05:00 Elena Pompey of Enter, thank you very much.
05:02 - Thank you.