‘Too Much or Too Little Repression’: The Fall of AKEL, 1949–1955

Abstract

As in Hong Kong, the years between 1949 and the mid-1950s saw a rise in government repression in Cyprus as a means to counter perceived communist threats on the cultural battlefields of the imperial Cold War. With constitutional advancement still nominally the goal, the Cyprus government, now led by Sir Andrew Wright, returned to politics of force, such as press censorship and the tightening of immigration laws, aimed to destroy AKEL. AKEL’s position as chief troublemaker, however, was increasingly usurped by the Greek-Cypriot nationalists. Despite AKEL’s adoption of relatively law-abiding tactics as an attempt to capitalize on the nationalists’ violent turn, the Cyprus government was nevertheless undeterred from its Cold War against the Cypriot communists. In fact, as this chapter concludes, even with EOKA’s revolt commencing on 1 April 1955, the Cold War remained the principal consideration in British policy-making, and the Cyprus government finally proscribed AKEL later that year.