Museum of Barbarism reopens
Site of 1963 mass murder is opened to the public following renovation project
THE Museum of Barbarism in Lefkoşa has reopened its doors after work to renovate and restore it was completed.
The work was carried out by the Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TİKA). A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held at the museum on Wednesday .
The ceremony was attended by various dignitaries including President Ersin Tatar, Parliament Speaker Zorlu Töre, Prime Minister Ünal Üstel, Turkey’s ambassador to Lefkoşa Ali Murat Başçeri, ministers, senior military officials and Turkey’s Tourism Minister Nuri Ersoy, among others.
The building that now houses the Museum of Barbarism is one that holds deep historical importance for the Turkish Cypriots, as it was the scene of one of the most brutal attacks committed by the terrorist organisation Eoka.
They had targeted the Kumsal neighbourhood of Lefkoşa in the days running up to Christmas 1963, and while Major Dr Nihat İlhan was on duty, Eoka gunmen invaded his home and murdered his wife Mürüvvet and his three sons, six-year-old Murat, fouryear-old Kutsi, and six-monthold Hakan, leaving their bodies soaked in blood in the house’s bathtub.
The photograph of the slain children in the bathtub became one of the most iconic images of the conflict in Cyprus, and the house was first opened to the public as the Museum of Barbarism on January 1, 1966.
Mr Tatar, Mr Töre and Mr Üstel all gave speeches at the reopening in which they condemned the “barbaric” killings.