The summer of 1974—shaped by war, civil conflict, coups, hunger, displacement, missing people, captivity and suffering—left a mark on the lives of almost everyone over 40 on the island. The story of the three-month captivity of 75 mujahideen from the Lefke, Gaziveren and Doğancı area is one of the accounts now preserved through testimony in Unknown Prisoners. It also includes the memories and experiences of Turkish journalists who lived through the conflict, were taken prisoner and lost colleagues.
Unknown Prisoners is a book built from more than 25 hours of interviews conducted over two years by Cem Kar, a young Turkish journalist who had worked for different newspapers and television stations in the TRNC for about a decade, together with archival documents and accounts from Turkish and Greek Cypriot officials. The book uses a novel-like screenplay format made entirely of testimony; Kar also produced a documentary film.
The book focuses on the mujahideen of the Lefke area, who experienced the war and captivity in the summer of 1974. In their own words, it tells how 75 men were taken from their homes on 22 July, moved to an unknown location and held in a military camp in Limassol, with their whereabouts unknown for months.
For the first time, the book records the names and photographs of the mujahideen. It also presents, in their own words, the experiences of Turkish journalists who came to Cyprus to cover the war and their encounters with the “unknown” prisoners.
Ergin Konuksever, Ertürk Yöndem, Mete Akyol, Yücel Hacaloğlu, Hüdai Bayık and Hami Sami Coşar are among them. All were captured, some were wounded, and their accounts describe their capture and exchange, as well as hidden tragedies and details of Cyprus’s history.
A separate chapter tells the story of journalist Adem Yavuz, who died after being seriously wounded in the war. The book also recounts how a note carried by the journalists helped make the 75 mujahideen known and contributed to their release, alongside the diplomatic efforts that led to the journalists’ exchange.
The book also includes the accounts of Major Christos Tsangaris, a personal guard of Makarios and Clerides who helped free the Turkish journalists from EOKA members; Rauf Denktaş, leader of the Turkish Cypriot community at the time; Turkish government spokesperson Orhan Birgit; and Emine Mesaryalı and her husband, who were in the minibus in which Adem Yavuz was shot. The massacre at Taşkent, where 89 Turkish Cypriots were killed, is also documented in a separate chapter.