16 Geographica Helvetica Jg. 62 2007/Heft 1

«The shadows of no man's land». Crossing the border in the divided capitalof Nicosia, Cyprus

Freerk Boedeltje, Henk van Houtum, Olivier ThomasKramsch, Nijmegen

«[I]n spite ot progress made in cross-cultural scholar-

ship in the past few decades. there remains a tendency toview the non-West either as a residual category or as anexotic organism resisting comparison. A perspective that

can advance such categories as <oriental despotism> and

<oriental mode of production» can equally well embracethe notion of an «oriental city> existing beyond history and

analysis» (Brown 1973:18).

1 Introduction

The Republic of Cyprus has been a member-stateof the European Union (EU) since May 2004. Since1974 it is divided by a UN patrolled buffer zonerunning from west to east, straight through the citycentre of its capital, Nicosia. Greek and Turkish Cyp-riots have lived here in a tenuous State of cease-firesince the UN stepped in to settle the conflict that hadarisen due to an attempted coup to unite the island,which led to the subsequent invasion of the northernhalf of the island by Greece and Turkey. From thatpoint on, contact between Greek and Turkish Cyp-riot communities was almost impossible. In April2003, the buffer zone (or Green Line) was unexpecl-edly opened, propelled by the prospect of EU acces-sion of Cyprus. On May 1,2004, however, only GreekCyprus joined the EU. As the EU regards the GreekCyprus authority as the sole authority on the island,the EU accession papers were settled and ratified inthe name of the Republic of Cyprus only. After twoyears of EU membership, the Republic of Cyprus is

seen as a positive construct by the people of NorthernCyprus, however, perhaps not in a manner Europeor the Greek Cypriot authorities originally planned.Northern Cyprus has been able to benefit from theEuropean Common Market through the grey zonethat the aceptis communautaire allows for. Afternearly three years of free movement, people interact;more specifically, they mainly work and shop on the«other» side. However, in official discourse, Nicosia is

still seen as a divided city and with the deadlock onTurkish EU accession talks it will probably remain soin the near future.

Within the EU today, there is no other urban areathat offers as vivid an example of inter-cultural con¬

flict, adaptation and exchange between a putative«east» and «west» as in Nicosia. This fact is exploitedin countless tourist brochures and related Public¬ity, with Nicosia referring to itself somewhat self-confidently as «the last divided capital in Europe».Despite its current partitioning, Nicosia today maybe understood as a «palimpsest» (Grundy-Warr2002: 219), whereby older spatial patterns of colo¬nial rule have entered into complex and multi-lay-ered discourse with the Cypriot present. This is par¬ticularly evident on both sides of the Green Linein contemporary attempts at economic reform, EUmembership, adaptation and modernization. In thisarticle, the Nicosian palimpsest is explored througha description of the daily irregularities of a contem¬

porary city border in this last divided capital of theEuropean Union.

2 A «lie» called Cyprus

Cyprus is a clearly defined entity located squarely onthe crossroads between Europe and Asia. betweenthe western and non-western world. The coastline onGreek Cyprus embraces everything that is connectedto the European, to that which is international, «turbo-capitalistic» and touristic, while siphoning out capi¬tal and knowledge. The coastline on Turkish Cyprusreceives «invisible» people and products, invisiblein the sense that in the north, there is no agreementabout what the political space should be referred to as

Turkish, Northern Cyprian (legal title) or as the Turk¬ish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) (inofficialtitle). Nonetheless, this invisible territory is accessibleto everyone. It is a confusing space, and although phys-ically constructed of the same minerals as the south,it has a totally different meaning on this part of theisland.

O'Toole (1997: 4) writes about «the lie of the land;in the sense that the people and the land are nolonger co-terminous». In the case of Cyprus, it is

suggested here that its history of division has hada similar effect on it. Postcolonial independenceand the evolving conflict and division detached thepeople from their physical and mental land. Cyprusnever managed to create a national consciousnessas an expression of a national culture. it turnedtowards the past, resulting in current events beingexperienced differently within the two civil societies(Fanon 1961).

«The shadows of no man's land» Freerk Boedeltje, Henk van Houtum, Olivier Thomas Kramsch 17

3 No man's land

From the Greek Cypriot airport in Larnaca, it takesless than an hour to complete the 56-kilometre rideto downtown Nicosia, the capital of Cyprus, a citywith nearly 200'000 inhabitants. The Greek Cyprioturban milieu may be cosmopolitan, yet at a micro-scale, society is still essentially colonial, reflectingthe impact made by Cyprus' last colonial empire,Great-Britain. Life in Nicosia is busy. trendy and ina systematic rush.The atmosphere in this part of thecity is international. The uniform-styled shops andrestaurants of the main Shopping street, Ledra Street,within the walls of the old city, end suddenly and sur-really at a barbed-wire military wall: Nicosia's GreenLine. This in-between zone, dead zone, or no man'sland has led to a peculiar Situation: two cities withtheir main centres in the outskirts and the outskirtsin the centre snuffed out by a ceasefire line. Whenobserving the fragments of Nicosia, it becomes clearthat it is impossible to put all the pieces together in anattempt to grasp the whole picture, as there is none.Nicosia is not one but two, as much as there are nowalso two versions of Cyprus.

The old city of Nicosia is promoted in the touristbrochures as a beautiful district with many historicalrelics. Although the adverts mention its unique Vene-tian Walls, built in 1570 to protect the city from theOttomans, no mention is made of the UN buffer zonedividing the old town in two, nor of the Communityexisting on the other side. This disregard of the currentwall of Separation, or of the Cyprus conflict as a whole,is not something peculiar to hotel brochures, touristinformation, maps and travel agencies alone. In thesouthern part of the city, every Single official map ofthe city stops at the Green Line. To its north, a wholepart of the city is denied contemporary existence. Itis a place where the streets have no name. an areadenoted as «non-accessible because of Turkish occu¬pation». For the official Greek Cypriot authorities, theoccupied territory ultimately represents a denial ofTurkish Cypriot civil society as an integrated territo¬rial part on the island.

This form of denial seems completely illogical, evenabsurd for tourists, foreigners and researchers, whofind it impossible to ignore the presence of a dead

space that exists and is tangible, both physically andmentally. However, in the everyday reality of theCypriols this appears to be different. The division hasbecome embedded within Cypriot society through theactions of the past. Its effects are not only reflected ina distorted self-image, as observed in the inability ofpeople to characterise what it means to be a Cypriot,but also implicates a complete and ongoing institu-tionalisation of the Green Line. Consequently, with

every attempt taken to resolve the Situation, a Solu¬

tion seems further away and the institutionalisationof a culture of denial one step closer (OToole 1990).This culture of denial may be seen today in officialgeopolitical disputes.The Cyprus problem has becomea breakpoint issue for EU accession talks with Turkey.On the one hand, Turkey is not willing to ratify theEU customs' treaty and open its ports and airports tothe Republic of Cyprus, because it does not recognizethe Cypriot administration. On the other hand, it is

insisting that international sanctions against North¬ern Cyprus be loosened. Today, at least. if judging byofficial discourse, unification seems further away thenever before.

Mr Talat, Prime Minister of the Turkish Cypriotauthority, for example, recently claimed that

«[t]he Greek Cypriots are not acting like an EU country.They are not trying to compromise or give any rights tothe Turkish Cypriots. Unfortunately. the EU is not actingin a proper way to preclude these ill intentions» (Bahceli2005).

According to the Turkish Cypriots, the assistanceand aid promised after the accession of the Republicof Cyprus has not ended their isolated position. Thisappears to be particularly apparent in aid package dis¬

cussions and in the dissatisfactory results ofthe GreenLine Regulations agreement (Bahceli 2005). On theother hand, the Greek Cypriot authorities repeatedlyaccuse their Turkish Cypriot counterparts for not con-tributing towards finding a satisfactory Solution for theCyprus problem, as is exemplified in the press releaseof June 19,2006:

«If there is a justification for MrTalal's weakness to con¬trol his political actions. there is no justification for his

weakness to control his political speech. His latest remarksabout an <insane and comical policy of President Papa-dopoulos on the Cyprus issue> have exceeded every limit.If these Statements are not a result of embarrassment and

confusion on his part. then they are simply a reaffirmationof his inlransigence and his unwillingness to cooperate onfinding a mutually acceptable Solution to the Cyprus prob¬lem» (Republic of Cyprus 2006).

As a commentator of the Cyprus Mail wrote:«Unfortunately. it's 40 years down the line and we are stillbehaving with the same narrow-mindedness that led us lothis sad slate of affairs in the first place. Instead of lookingto the future and seeking to escape this dead end. we playthe semantics game and squabble over meaningless things.searching for excuses to perpetuate the current division.[...] this is because our politicians build their careers on

perpetuating partition» (Cyprus Mail 2006).

The ongoing geopolitical institutionalisation of theGreen Line signifies the portrayal of large swathesof Middle and Near Eastern cityscape as privileged

18 Geographica Helvetica Jg. 62 2007/Heft

theatre for the conjunction of insecurity and conflict(Graham 2004; Gregory 2004). It addresses a side ofmodernity which, for the most part, has been neglecteduntil now in a literature largely devoted to extollingthe progressive and cosmopolitan values attached tourban life in the world's cities (Abu-Lughod 1999;Sandercock 1998; Sassen 2001; Soja 2000). Thishypothesis of a mutually constitutive relationshipbetween cities of conflict and political nationalisticdeadlock is an intriguing one. In this context, it seemsthat the current re-focus of urban studies around the«hidden planning history» of place annihilation andthe installation of a dead zone in a city - aptly coined«urbicide» (Graham 2004: 34) - relies on the broad

sweep of theoretical generalization to make its Claims

ultimately meaningless. Cities should not be regardedas merely passive Containers for the social relationsof conflict but as both their medium and prerequi-site. In reality, a «dead zone» is never dead. It wouldseem that the paths and journeys of the contemporaryshadows of the no man's land in divided cities, suchas Nicosia, resist or go beyond official geopoliticalrhetoric and are continuously changing. Certainly, inthe light of the current deadlock in the Cyprus issueand the EU accession talks of Turkey, it is necessaryto see the vilality, vividness and activity surroundingthe Green Line that in political discourse is reasoned

away. It is argued here for greater acknowledgementof daily minor, yet vital, changes in routines, journeysand habits linked to the crossing of the Green Line,to the voices unheard, to the shadows of the no man'sland.

4 Crossing the Green Line

In April 2003, in the run up to the EU accession talksplanned for Cyprus in 2004, the border was openedfor the first time since 1974, allowing people to travelvia a border Checkpoint from north to south and vice

versa. In the first months after the opening, thousandscrossed, either out of curiosity or to meet with forgot-ten friends, either to see the places they had to leaveor give up after the events of the 1960s and 1970s, orto feel a sense of reconciliation.The main Checkpointin Nicosia at Ledra Palace is only accessible by foot.According to official statistics, by the end of 2004, a

total of 2,347,792 Greek Cypriots and 3,595,979 Turk¬ish Cypriots had crossed the Checkpoints since thetime of their opening in April 2003. The latter crossed

over to the south predominantly on weekdays, mainlylo work, while Greek Cypriots tended to travel northon weekends to shop or sightsee (Hazou 2005). Thefigures, however, also indicate that many Cypriotsfrom both sides of the Green Line did not cross; somebecause of their anger, some out of protest againstthe need to show their passports on their own island,

others because of their unwillingness to forgive. The

terminology used by the Greek Cypriot officials todescribe border movement illustrates vividly currentattitudes: the Turkish Cypriots do not cross the GreenLine, but «enter» the «free areas», as if to imply thatthey are «outlaws», persons beyond (international)law living in restricted, non-free areas. The GreekCypriots on the other hand «travel» to the «occupied»areas and «cross» the Green Line.

On August 10, 2004, shortly after the EU accessionof Cyprus. the Green Line Regulation became fullyoperational. Subsequently. traffic of commoditiesfrom northern to southern Cyprus was restricted orpartially deregulated (European Commission (COM)2005). As a result, border traffic increased steadily.mainly from north to south. With the increase camean observable change in crossing intention. Peoplewere suddenly able to buy goods that had not beenavailable to them before. They were able to partici-pate in European commercial markets and buy con¬

sumer goods which they could take back with themto the north. On a larger scale, people started trad¬

ing. The volume and value of the goods that crossesthe line remains small scale and rather limited but itis nonetheless on the increase. The amount of goodsthat crossed the line officially between April 2004and April 2005 totals to just over one million Euros(European Commission (COM) 2005). Vegetables,stone products, paper goods, and furniture are themain commodities. The destination of the goods is

without exception Greek Cyprus, an indication thatthere is no direct trade between Northern Cyprus andthe EU via the Green Line.

Undoubtedly, the principal change in the nature of the

crossings is labour-oriented, with an ever increasingamount of Turkish Cypriots working in Greek Cyprusas cheap labour. Everyday, thousands cross the GreenLine to be picked up by Greek Cypriot companiescatering for construction and related sectors. In 2004,

an estimated £ 40 million was paid to Turkish Cypriotemployees in the south and this doubled to £ 85 mil¬

lion in 2005. According to Hazou (2005), the averageTurkish Cypriot wage increased by $ 3,000 per annumin 2004. Similarly, the Minister of Finance of the Turk¬ish Cypriot Administration, Mr Deniz, claimed thatearnings from Turkish Cypriots working in the southcontributed largely to the general increase in Turk¬ish Cypriot salaries. Estimated figures on the numberof Turkish Cypriots working in the south ränge from3,000 to 8,000 (Bahceli 2004). The average earningsof Turkish Cypriots working in the south are esti¬

mated around £ 8,000 per year. In contrast, the aver¬

age income of people employed in Northern Cyprus is

£ 3,500, despite the increase of wages in the past years(Hazou 2005).

«The shadows of no man's land» Freerk Boedeltje, Henk van Houtum, Olivier Thomas Kramsch 19

Besides the officially documented crossings, it hasbecome increasingly clear that the Green Line isalso used for illegal trafficking of people. Despitethe controls carried out on both sides, illegal routesexist predominantly in the northern, more rural partof the buffer zone. Thousands of illegal third countrynationals are said to cross the Green Line, of whichmany of them have requested asylum in the Repub¬lic of Cyprus. This has led to a consequent increase inasylum application numbers (European Commission(COM) 2005).

Besides commercial and labour crossborder inter¬action, people from the north increasingly cross tomake use of the well developed public sector in GreekCyprus. Ambulances cross the Checkpoint to bringill patients to Greek Cypriot hospitals. According toHazou (2005) and official statistics, over 12,000 Turk¬ish Cypriots, for example, received treatment betweenJanuary and November 2004.

In addition, more and more students are crossingover to the south to study at Greek Cypriot univer¬sities in order to gain an internationally recogniseddegree. At the same time, people from the southcross over to go to cheaper dentists and buy cheaperfood. Many commercial shops in the north nowaccept both currencies, both the Turkish Lira and theCypriot Pound. First signs of gentrification have alsobecome visible in the old city near the mosque, andthe first trendy bars have opened their doors in thenorth.

But perhaps the greatest motivation for crossing theborder is the better access to Europe and Europeancitizenship through application for a Greek Cypriotpassport. All of this has left a noticeable mark on Turk¬ish Cypriot society. Home in north Nicosia meant for a

long time what Said observed as«the unhealable rift forced belween a human being and a

native place, between the seif and ils true home: its essen¬

tial sadness can never be surmounted» (2000: 173).North Nicosia was a place which almost did not exist.Now blood seems to be flowing through its veins. Itstill is neither a country, nor a federal region, nor a

colonial territory, and it is denied existence on anynon-Turkish Cypriot map. It still has no postal code,nor co-ordinates for air or sea traffic, except withTurkey. Northern Cyprus has been denied access tohistory, being seen in retrospect simply as a placeoccupied by the Turkish Army. But now this partof the island is profiting from the Green Line: thebuffer zone that was for a long time seen as a secu¬rity necessity has become a line of opportunity. It isno longer solely associated with a constant state ofinsecurity, in-betweenness and precarious temporal-ity.

5 The road ahead

The present Situation in Nicosia would possibly haveled to a scenario of unification or at least some sortof positive breakthrough if it had been dealt withat a geopolitical expert meeting twenty years ago.However. the opposite is currently the case. Con¬

flicting discourses and conflicts of interests are stillhighly visible. However, it would seem that beyondthe deadlock of the conflicting geopolitical dis¬

courses, the road ahead is positive. Nicosia, and withit Cyprus. appears to have developed an identity thatbreaks away from the domination of the dead zoneof no man's land. Now, increasingly, a new on-the-ground-reality is being created and a new meaningof border as line of opportunity is being provoked.This change calls for a redefinition of this uniqueand unusual contra Intervention of north «non-west-ern» Nicosia within the long-standing and mutuallyentangled relationship of western and non-westernurban modernities throughout much of the contem¬

porary world. It is argued here that this new map ofsubterranean affiliations binding eastern and westernurban modernities together as part of a fragmented.conflictual but nevertheless coherent System, canfunction as a breeding space for future interaction.Despite official attempts from both sides to gener¬ate contemporary geopolitical discourses and Spacesof included-exclusion. il indeed (re)produces newlyinvigorated «political societies», but with the greatdifference that contemporary Spaces of included-inclusion have been generated in northern Nicosia(Chatterjee 2004; Gilroy 2005; Pratt 1992). It hasalso been argued that the new-born on-the-groundand grassroots realities and newly created Spaces ofopportunity after 2004 have invoked a new politicalreality beyond the official domain. For this reason, itseems important to shed light on these newly arisingshadow spaces, these voices unheard, these «hidden»trajectories of urban osmosis, created and enforced inthe light of the EU membership of Cyprus. It appearsequally necessary to assess the long-term impact ofthe porous Green Line on the fabric of the city ofNicosia. and the capacity for adaptation, co-optationand resistance, through new spectacles.

AcknowledgementThis research has been funded by the EU's 5"1 frame¬work research grant (EXLINEA, project numberHPSE-CT-2002-00141).

ReferencesAbu-Lughod, J.L. (1999): New York, Chicago, LosAngeles: America's global cities. - Minneapolis: Uni¬versity of Minnesota Press.

20 Geographica Helvetica Jg. 62 2007/Heft 1

Bahceli, S. (2004): Economy in the north is booming.- In: Cyprus Mail, internet edition. October 12.

Bahceli, S. (2005): Abandoned by the EU. - In: CyprusMail, internet edition, September 25.

Brown, L.C. (eds) (1973): From madina to metropolis:heritage and change in the Near Eastern city. - Prince¬

ton, NJ:The Darwin Press.

Chatterjee, R (2004): The politics of the governed:populär politics in most of the world. - New York:Columbia University Press.Cyprus Mail (2006): Mr Talat: please take down thebridge and open Ledra. - In: Cyprus Mail, internet edi¬

tion, February 5.

European Commission (COM) (2005): Report on the

implantation of Council Regulation (EC) 866/2004 of29 April 2004 and the Situation resulting from its appli¬cation (COM, 2005). - Brüssels, published February 5,

2006.Fanon, F. (1961): The wretched of the Earth. - NewYork: Grove Press.

Gilroy, R (2005): Postcolonial melancholia. - NewYork: Columbia University Press.

Graham, S. (ed.) (2004): Cities, war, and terrorism:towards an urban geopolitics. - Oxford: Blackwell.Gregory, D. (2004):The colonial present: Afghanistan,Palestine, Iraq. - Oxford: Blackwell.Grundy-Warr, C. (2002): Cross-border regional-ism through a «South-east Asian» looking-glass. - In:Space & polity 6.2:215-225.Hazou, E. (2005): Money pouring into the north. - In:Cyprus Mail, internet edition, January 18.

O'Toole, F. (1990): A mass for Jesse James: A journeythrough 1980s Ireland. - Dublin: Raven Arts.O'Toole, F. (1997): The lie ofthe land.-London, NewYork: Verso.Pratt, M.L. (1992): Imperial eyes: travel writing andtransculturation.- London: Routledge.Republic of Cyprus (2006): Press and Informationoffice, http://www.moi.gov.cy/moi/pio/pio.nsf/releases_en/releases_en?OpenDocument&y=2006&m=5&e=28.11.2006.Said, E.W. (2000): Reflections on exile and otheressays. - Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Sandercock, L. (1998): Towards cosmopolis: planningfor multicultural cities. - New York: John Wiley.Sassen, S. (2001): The global city: New York, London,Tokyo. - Princeton. NJ: Princeton University Press.

Soja, E.W. (2000): Postmetropolis: critical studies ofcities and regions. - Maiden: Blackwell.

Summary: «The shadows of no man's land».Crossing the border in the divided capital cityof Nicosia, CyprusIn May 2004, only Greek Cyprus joined the Euro¬

pean Union. The EU did not negotiate with NorthernCyprus as the Greek Cypriot government is acknowl-

edged as sole representative of Cyprus. Despite this.after more than two years of EU membership. theRepublic of Cyprus is seen in a positive light by thepeople of Northern Cyprus. Through the grey zone ofthe acepiis communautaire. north Nicosia and Cyprusprofit from European modernisation and the commonmarket. Although the northern part of the islandis still often labelled as «oecupied territory», in thelight of recent European developments. Nicosia, andwith it Cyprus. seem to no longer be solely defined bytheir Green Line. This grey. self-created Option meansthat the EU has indeed had a significant effect onthe «Cyprus issue». For the Greek Cypriot authori¬ties, their hoped-for advantage of a stronger negotia-tion position in Europe did not turn out as expected.For the north, their fragile socio-economic structuresappear to have benefited from the common marketwith the Republic of Cyprus. Despite the current par-titioning of Nicosia. this city may therefore be under¬stood today as a unique example of urban osmosis.Theconclusion is made that both the long-term impact ofthe new osmosis which is taking place at street level inthe city of Nicosia. and the city's capacity for co-opta-tion and resistance. should be assessed and perceivednot in the form of traditional geopolitical narratives.but in a form more sensitive to its complex context.

Zusammenfassung: «Schatten des Niemandslandes»in Nicosia. Überquerung der Grenze in dergeteilten Hauptstadt ZypernsIm Mai 2004 trat nur der griechische Teil Zypernsder Europäischen Union bei. Somit wurde die grie¬chisch-zypriotische Regierung als alleinige Vertre¬

tung Zyperns anerkannt. Nach mehr als zwei JahrenMitgliedschaft in der EU ist nun auch die RepublikZypern für den türkischen Norden der Insel vonBedeutung. Durch die Grauzonen des acquis com¬munautaire profitieren auch der Norden Nicosiasund Zyperns von der europäischen Modernisierungund dem gemeinsamen Markt. Der nördliche Teil derInsel wurde oft als «besetztes Gebiet» bezeichnet. InAnbetracht der jüngsten europäischen Entwicklungenscheinen Nicosia und mit ihm Zypern allerdings nichtmehr allein durch die Green Line (grüne Grenzlinie)definiert zu sein. Diese selbst geschaffene Optiondeutel darauf hin. daß die EU tatsächlich eine prä¬gende Wirkung auf das Zypernproblem hatte. Für diegriechisch-zypriotische Regierung brachte der EU-Beitritt nicht den erhofften Vorteil einer verbessertenVerhandlungsposition in Europa. Zudem scheinen diefragilen sozioökonomischen Strukturen des Nordensvom gemeinsamen Markt der Republik Zypern zuprofitieren. Trotz der nach wie vor existierenden Tei¬

lung könnte man Nicosia als einen einzigartigen Fallvon städtischer Osmose bezeichnen. Es wird gefolgert,daß die langfristige Wirkung dieser neuen Osmose, diein den Strassen Nicosias stattfindet, und die Fähigkeit

«The shadows of no man's land» Freerk Boedeltje, Henk van Houtum, Olivier Thomas Kramsch 21

zu Vereinnahmung und Widerstand über die üblichengeopolitischen Narrative hinausgehen und aus einerspeziellen Perspektive betrachtet werden sollten.

Resume: «Les ombres du no man's land». Traverser lafrontiere dans la capitale divisee de Nicosie (Chypre)En mai 2004, seule la partie grecque de l'ile de Chypre- nommee officiellement Republique de Chypre - a

rejoint l'Union europeenne (UE). Son gouvemementfut alors reconnu comme l'unique representant de

Chypre. Cependant, le rattachement de la Republiquede Chypre a egalement eu des consequences pour les

populations de la Republique turque de Chypre duNord. Gräce aux acquis communautaires, le nord dela ville de Nicosie et de Chypre profitent egalement dela modernisation europeenne et du marche commun.Bien que le nord de l'ile soit souvent qualifie de «ter¬ritoire occupe», ä la lumiere des developpementseuropeens recents, Nicosie et Chypre ne sont plus uni-quement definis par l'existence de la Ligne verte sepa-rant les deux entites. Les initiatives locales monlrentque l'Union europeenne a eu un effet important surChypre dans son ensemble. Pour les autorites chyprio-tes grecques, les espoirs places dans la constructioneuropeenne n'ont pas ete ä la mesure de leurs espe-rances. En outre, les fragiles structures socio-economi¬

ques du nord semblent beneficier du marche commun

realise en Republique de Chypre. Malgre sa partitionactuelle, Nicosie peut aujourd'hui etre considereecomme un exemple d'osmose urbaine. C'est pourquoil'article conclut en relevant que les effets ä long termede cette evolution ä Nicosie, de meme que les capaci¬tes de cooptation et de resistance qui s'y manifestem,ne peuvent plus etre apprehendes selon une lecturegeopolitique traditionnelle, mais selon une perspectiverenouvelee.

Dr. Freerk Boedeltje, Dr. Henk van Houtum, Dr. Oli¬vier Thomas Kramsch, Nijmegen Centre for BorderResearch, Department of Geography, Radboud Uni¬versity Nijmegen, P.O. Box 9108, NL-6500 HK Nijme¬gen, The Netherlands,e-mail:f.boedeltje@fm.ru.nlh.vanhoutum@fm.ru.nlo.kramsch@fm.ru.nl

Manuskripteingang/received/meinuscrit entre le

11.7.2006Annahme zum Druck/accepted for publication/acceptepour Timpression: 26.2.2007