History of Cyprus United Kingdom. In 1925, following the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, Cyprus was made a Crown Colony. Between 1955 and 1959 EOKA was created by Greek Cypriots and led by George Grivas to perform enosis (union of the island with Greece). However the EOKA campaign did not result in union with Greece but rather an independent republic, The Republic of Cyprus, in 1960. The 1960 constitution put in place a form of power-sharing, or consociational government, in which concessions were made to the Turkish Cypriots minority, including as a requirement that the vice-president of Cyprus and at least 30% of
History of nationality in Cyprus inhabitants having expressed support for Greek union, there was no response from either Greece or Britain as they did not want to disrupt their bilateral relations. Turkey in the meantime reacted to the Greek appeal to the UN by taking measures against the Greek community in Turkey. From confiscation of property to the expulsion of thousands of people, Turkey argued that Greece was pursuing a policy of using ethnic justification to conceal their territorial expansion policies. Turkey thus proposed that Cyprus was very important to Turkish security and that the island should be put back into Turkish control as it