Over 120 British nationals, many of them of Turkish Cypriot descent, are currently stranded in North Cyprus, unable to get any flights back to the UK. All international flights on both sides of the Cyprus divide were grounded In March to contain the coronavirus pandemic. In the same month, UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab announced […]
I was deeply saddened to hear the news of Aysın Yılmaz’s passing. I had the honour of working with her during my time as a committee member of the Council of Turkish Cypriot Associations in Britain (CTCA UK) when she was president (2013-2015). She took on the presidency at a time when the CTCA had […]
The run-up to Thursday’s General Election has seen furious debates and deep divisions among friends and families as we try to promote the best party we feel best reflects our world view, values and aspirations. One politician who has managed to unite the entire British Turkish community in condemnation is Theresa Villiers, the long-standing Conservative […]
One of the most closely contested constituencies of this General Election is one in East London. Labour are after a big scalp: that of Iain Duncan Smith, the former Conservative leader and architect of the widely despised Universal Credit benefits system. Standing against him is Faiza Shaheen, a 36-year-old British economist. The Labour candidate grew […]
On Thursday, 12 December, the United Kingdom will head to the polls in a bid to break the current Parliamentary deadlock, in what is sure to be a pivotal moment in our country’s history. For the Conservative Party, this election is about getting Brexit done. Ever since the UK voted to leave the European Union […]
On Saturday, 26 October, the Labour members of Enfield North will have the chance to listen to four very able candidates and select which one should represent them as the Labour Parliamentary candidate at the next general election. Among the four is Margaret Greer, one of my oldest and dearest friends. Here’s why I feel […]
Galip Ahmet is one of the first Turkish Cypriots to have come and settled in Britain in the early 1950s. Born in Cyprus on 18 April 1929, Galip Bey recently turned 90. I interviewed him earlier this summer about his experiences before and after his move, as part of my work on ‘Turkish heritage in […]
A group of British MPs, who can broadly be described as “the usual suspects”, have all recently fallen over themselves to repeat, parrot fashion, every piece of Greek Cypriot propaganda ever invented since 1974, when the Turkish Army legally intervened in Cyprus under the terms of the Treaty of Guarantee. Balance dictates the necessity to […]
It is very difficult to write an obituary if the person was very dear to you and held a special place in your life. You try to put the words together, but after a while the blank paper in front of you remains just the same as you had started, completely blank. This happened to […]
In 1939, when London was being relentlessly bombed by Nazi Germany, the British Government put into place one of the largest evacuation plans ever seen, moving over 1.5 million children from London to rural locations around the country considered to be safe from bombing. Strangers opened their doors to these children and welcomed them, away […]
