Turkish-speaking Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar hastened to criticise Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades for calling the Turkish-speaking Cypriots his fellow citizens despite the entire world, with the exception of Turkey, recognising this fact.
Tatar claimed that the Turkish-speaking Cypriots are citizens of the so-called "Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus."
However, his response was in order to distract the revelation that he himself has a passport of the Republic of Cyprus despite not even recognising the country.
In fact, almost all members of the so-called "cabinet" of the pseudo-state have Republic of Cyprus passports.
The so-called "Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus" is an illegal entity established after the Turkish invasion of northern Cyprus in 1974.
No other state in the world recognises the pseudo-state, besides Turkey, as it is deemed an illegal entity by United Nations Security Council Resolution 541 and UN Security Council Resolution 550.
It is estimated that 140,000 Turkish-speaking Cypriots have passports and IDs of the Republic of Cyprus and another 140,000 have other official documents of the Republic of Cyprus.
In a written statement, Tatar claimed that many citizens of the pseudo-state "have an identity card and a passport of the Republic of Cyprus for different purposes" and it does not mean that they are citizens of the Republic of Cyprus.
The Turkish-speaking Cypriot leader said that as a person born in 1960 it was natural for him to have a birth certificate of the Republic of Cyprus like everyone else based on the practices of that period and that his decision was to cancel this certificate.
It still does not explain why he has a Republic of Cyprus passport that would have expired multiple times over the course of his life.
He also claimed that President Anastasiades hid the reasons why Turkish-speaking Cypriots have passports of the Republic of Cyprus.
Tatar claimed that after the events of 1963, Turkish-speaking Cypriots were expelled from the Republic of Cyprus and their rights were usurped.
READ MORE: India blasts Turkey’s violations of UN Security Council resolutions on Cyprus.
