Makarios III the British press as a crooked Cypriot priest and viewed with suspicion by the British authorities, was intercepted by Special Branch officers while attempting to board a flight at Nicosia airport. The joint police/military plan, codenamed Operation Apollo, saw Makarios exiled to Mahe Island in the Seychelles on 9 March 1956, as a 'guest' of Sir William Addis, Governor & Commander-in-Chief of the Seychelles. The Archbishop and his staff were flown to Aden and then on to Mombasa. At the Kenyan port the party were embarked in the East African Naval Vessel "Rosalind", escorted by the frigate HMS "Loch Fada".
Makarios III Klerides visited Makarios in an unsuccessful attempt to promote a solution. On 15 July 1974 Ioannides took Makarios by surprise by organizing a coup d'état in Nicosia at 8.15 in the morning when Makarios' forces were off guard. Makarios fled Cyprus when the coupist forces took control of the whole of Cyprus and was replaced by Nikos Sampson, a Cypriot newspaper editor and politician. Speaking to the UN Security Council on 19 July 1974, Makarios denounced the coup as an "invasion", engineered by the Greek military junta, which "violated the internal peace of Cyprus". Five hours after Makarios' address to