Joint May Day celebrations will be held for the first time in 56 years by Turkish Cypriot and Greek Cypriot unions in the UN buffer zone.
Celebrations will take place on Thursday, 1st May, at the Cetinkaya football stadium in the buffer zone at 7 pm.
Speaking at a press conference yesterday, General Secretary of Labour Federation PEO Pambis Kyritsis and leader of the Turkish Cypriot Revolutionary Trade Unions Federation DEV-iS Mehmet Seyis said that the joint celebration aims to send a message of unity among workers in Cyprus.
Reading the announcement in both Greek and Turkish, the two union leaders stressed that “the global economic crisis and its consequences have highlighted even further the common class interests of Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot workers, as well as the need to intensify their struggles against the measures of austerity and the abolition of workers’ achievements”.
The announcement which was co-authored by six unions and signed by a total of 54 Greek and Turkish Cypriot organisations points out that in both the North and the South workers and society at large are experiencing the results of the memorandum agreed by the government and which include the recession, a dramatic increase in unemployment and poverty, cuts to education and health and a sell-off of national wealth, among others.
It is however noted that the re-launching of negotiations to resolve the Cyprus problem is a “positive development”.
“A mutually accepted solution that expresses the interest of Cypriots is the common goal of Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot workers,” unions said.
The PEO is organising a gathering outside the Finance Ministry in Nicosia on Thursday, at 6 pm and participants will then march to the Cetinkaya football stadium in the buffer zone where events will begin at 7 pm.
The Cyprus Daily
