Turk Cypriot polls are a vote on hawkish Denktash

To some diplomats this bald, rotund, vivacious man has been the chief obstacle to reconciliation on the island, which was partitioned in a bitter war almost three decades ago.
But Denktash, 79, radiates an assurance that it is the world, not the Turkish Cypriot, that is askew.
The Turks, he argues, were the main victims of intercommunal bloodshed in the 1960s, yet the world ignored their plight and recognised Greek Cypriots as masters over the whole island.
”They’ve done us wrong,” he once said of the international community. ”They must put it right.”
Defiantly, he had the flag of his Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus — recognised only by Turkey — painted red and white onto a mountainside overlooking the divided capital.
The dispute between the two communities dates back to the days before independence from Britain in 1960. They could share a joke, enjoy a meal together, exchange greetings or condolences, but underlying suspicion was always there.
”I know their souls inside and out,” Denktash told Reuters, speaking of Greek Cypriots. Their goal, he believes, is still union with Greece and the banishment of Turks from Cyprus.
Contrary to his reputation as a steely negotiator, Denktash is not without charm and humour. He has a passion for photography and dogs and for breeding vociferous canaries.
He is no stranger to personal tragedy. Pictures of his eldest son, killed in a car crash, decorate his presidential palace. And he has lost two other children.
Denktash was educated in London as a barrister before returning to the ferment of Cyprus, where he helped found a Turkish-Cypriot paramilitary group, the TMT.
The group opposed the Greek-Cypriot EOKA which waged a guerrilla war on the British in the 1950s for ”Enosis” — union with Greece. Fear of Enosis haunted Turkish Cypriots through bloody intercommunal conflict in the 1960s and early 1970s.
In July, 1974, Greek Cypriots bent on union staged a coup with the backing of the military ruling Greece. Within days Turkey invaded and seized the island’s northern third. Effective partition, the nightmare of Greek Cypriots, became a reality.
Denktash’s critics on both sides of the divide see him as a Turkish patriot rather than a Cypriot, a man seeking not Enosis but ”Taksim” — partition and integration with Turkey.
”I am a Turk who lives in Cyprus,” he once said.