Resilience and Collapse: Notes from Cyprus Part Two
In this follow-up interview a year and a half later, Sofia describes how the explosion of interest and activity in permaculture, natural building, sustainability, resilience and relocalization in Cyprus is giving her renewed hope for the island’s future.
Cyprus is a tiny nation, but when its banking system collapsed from overexposure to Greek debt, it sent a chill through through the world economy: for the first time in living memory, a percentage of bank deposits were confiscated as part an agreement with EU leaders to bail out the country. This precedent threw into question not only the viability of the Euro currency and the European Union itself, but of the security of bank savings for ordinary people across the world.
Cyprus is comprised of an 80 percent Greek, 18 percent Turkish population; it has been de facto partitioned since the Turkish army invaded in 1974, taking over the northern 40 percent of the country. In 2004, Cyprus became part of the European Union.
Over the past 40 years, the intractability of “The Cyprus Problem” has puzzled and and confounded generations of peacemakers and diplomats, as recurring talks between representatives of the two sides collapsed, again and again.
Recent developments, though, have raised the hopes of many residents on the island; new negotiations between Cyprus president Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader, Mustafa Akinci, have been described by some observers as the most hopeful since the invasion.
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