The legacy of British rule in Cyprus

Sir, – Reading Michael Jansen’s mention of Field Marshal Sir John Harding’s role in the execution of alleged “terrorists” in Cyprus (“Greek Cypriot reaction to queen’s death is mainly muted or hostile” World, September 14th), reminds me that Lawrence Durrell, a philhellene, was director of information in Cyprus 1954-56.

While in his official capacity he was obliged to support the government, in private he regarded the appointment of the soldier Harding (replacing a civilian governor) as a major diplomatic mistake.

He deplored the strategy by which the British had introduced internment and suspended habeas corpus, setting Greek Cypriots against Turkish Cypriots who had up to then lived together in peace. In his diary for June 2nd, 1956, Durrell recorded of the Cypriots: “Their hatred of us is now complete. It is idle of Harding to talk about defeating ‘the terrorists’. He has successfully made all the Cypriots terrorists. We have lost something more than an imaginary ‘bastion of the free world’. We have inflicted a deep psychic shock on the Greeks which will never heal.”

It was a wound to Cyprus which Durrell continued to expose publicly after he resigned his appointment. – Yours, etc,