Rozdělený ostrov - Studená válka a „kyperská otázka“ v letech 1960-1974 – Koura Jan (2019)

The inhabitants of the Mediterranean island of Cyprus, which had been a British colony since 1925, began to intensively strive for independence after World War II. However, there were differing views on the decolonization process not only among the Greeks and Turks living on the island but also from their 'mother states' and Great Britain. From the mid-1950s, the conflict between Greek and Turkish Cypriots escalated to such an extent that it negatively impacted not only Greek-Turkish relations but also the situation in the Eastern Mediterranean, which represented a strategically important area in the context of the Cold War. After gaining independence in 1960, the situation on the island began to attract the intense interest of the United States and the Soviet Union, which, along with Czechoslovakia, supplied weapons to the island, contributing to even greater political instability that ultimately led to the division of the island into Greek and Turkish parts in 1974. This monograph aims to reassess the international dimension of the Cypriot conflict based on recently declassified archival materials, while not overlooking the activities of Eastern Bloc countries on the island, particularly Czechoslovakia.