UNFICYP Senior Advisor and Head, Civil Affairs, visit Pyla, Famagusta Avenue Garage

9 Oct 2019

UNFICYP Senior Advisor and Head, Civil Affairs, visit Pyla, Famagusta Avenue Garage

On 7 October 2019, UNFICYP Senior Advisor, Aderemi Adekoya, and Head, Civil Affairs, Faylene Woolley, visited the Mission's Sector 4 where they met with the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot mukhtars (mayors) of Pyla village. Both local representatives spoke frankly about the current challenges faced by the Pyla community as a whole and discussed specific issues of concern. Furthermore, they sought UNFICYP’s continued assistance and support in facilitating a stable security environment for the village’s residents. The fifth bicommunal Pyla Festival, an intercommunal event that UNFICYP has regularly supported, is due to take place on 11 and 12 October 2019.

Mr. Adekoya and Ms. Woolley also visited the Famagusta Avenue Garage, an intercommunal space in Deryneia, where organizations, groups and individuals from all communities across Cyprus come together in support of peaceful coexistence. “At UNFICYP we continue to support Cypriot civil society organisations who have dedicatedly taken the lead in ongoing inter-communal interactions on the island in past years. The Famagusta Avenue Garage, which started last year, has already made significant contributions to building trust and confidence among communities in Cyprus,” said Ms. Woolley.

For his part, Mr Adekoya stated that as a mission, UNFICYP strives to be increasingly agile and responsive to the needs of the people it serves in terms of current on-ground realities. “We need to consistently engage with local communities across the island to ensure that our civilian, military and police peacekeepers are serving the cause of sustainable peace across Cyprus in an effective, efficient and results-oriented manner.”

One of the longest-running United Nations peace operations, UNFICYP is mandated to use its best efforts to prevent a recurrence of fighting; contribute to the maintenance and restoration of law and order; and contribute to a return to normal conditions.