Pyla
The only village in the buffer zone where both communities live
The story
Pyla is a village in the Larnaca district inside the UN buffer zone, the strip between the 1974 ceasefire lines. According to the UN peacekeepers, UNFICYP, it is the only village where Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots live side by side, and the UN police keep order here. In the center, the Orthodox Church of Saint George and a mosque stand close to each other. Here and in Nicosia there are joint contact rooms, where representatives of the two communities share information about crimes. In August 2023 the Turkish Cypriot side began building a road to Pyla from the north on its own. It came to a clash with the peacekeepers, and on 9 October the UN agreed with both sides on how the work would be carried out.
Pyla is the only village in the UN buffer zone where Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots live together. The buffer zone is controlled by the UN, UNFICYP, while neighboring Dhekelia is a British Sovereign Base Area: these are different territories.
Visiting
The village is lived in and easy to reach by car from Larnaca. This is the UN buffer zone: don’t photograph military posts and don’t leave the roads toward the ceasefire line.
Photos
Sources
- UNFICYP — About the Buffer Zone (Pyla as the only village where Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots live side by side)
- UNFICYP — UN Police: maintaining law and order in the bi-communal village of Pyla
- Report of the Secretary-General on the United Nations Operation in Cyprus, S/2024/12, 3 January 2024 (paras. 9–12 on the Pyla/Pile plateau; para. 30 on the Joint Contact Room in Pyla)
- European Commission, COM(2026) 324 / Council doc. 11344/26 — 22nd report on the Green Line Regulation (Joint Contact Rooms in Nicosia and Pyla)
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