Nicosia Remains as World’s Only Divided City : Mediterranean: Ethnic Greeks and Turks fiercely resist U.N. attempts to demolish ‘Green Line.’

This is the last divided city, now that the Berlin Wall has fallen and the Lebanese are dismantling the line between Beirut’s Muslims and Christians.

It’s not an enviable status and there is no sign it will change soon, despite renewed efforts by the United Nations to reconcile ethnic Greeks and Turks.

Changing world conditions have raised hopes among the majority Greek Cypriots on this eastern Mediterranean island, who number about 500,000, that Nicosia’s “Green Line” will be demolished.

“The continuing enforced division of Nicosia is an anachronism after the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the new spirit of cooperation prevailing in the world,” President George Vassiliou, the Greek Cypriot leader, said in a speech.

Nicosia was divided in 1964 after hundreds of people were killed in three months of fighting between the Muslim ethnic Turks and Christian Greeks. The Green Line that snakes through the Old City got its name because a U.N. officer drew it on a map with green ink.

What was to be a temporary cease-fire line has lasted 26 years. The Green Line was lengthened into an unofficial border across the island after a Greek-sponsored coup in July, 1974, briefly ousted the late President Makarios and Turkey invaded, occupying the northern third of the island.

About 120,000 Turkish Cypriots living in the occupied zone proclaimed the region an independent Turkish Cypriot republic in 1983. Only Turkey recognizes it.

The Green Line is a maze of narrow alleyways and streets, overgrown with weeds, running through what used to be Nicosia’s main shopping area.

Blue-bereted troopers of the 2,100-man U.N. peacekeeping force patrol the no-man’s land between decaying, bullet-pocked buildings. Greek and Turkish Cypriot forces in sandbagged pillboxes are only a few yards apart at some points.

A dozen people have been killed along the Green Line since 1974, but there have been no serious encounters.

Greek Cypriots hope U.N. pressure on Iraq to withdraw from conquered Kuwait will force Turkey eventually to implement Security Council resolutions on Cyprus.

These demand the withdrawal of the 35,000 Turkish soldiers and 50,000 settlers from the north and the return to the region of 200,000 Greek Cypriots who fled in 1974 or were evicted.

Diplomatic sources say pressure on Turkey is unlikely now because of its growing importance in the U.N. trade embargo against Iraq.

Leaders of the Greek Cypriots note that Turkey is getting aid from Washington and the United Nations for its stand against Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, while refusing to implement Security Council resolutions on Cyprus.

“Such contradictions cannot be maintained under the new spirit of international unanimity,” government spokesman Akis Fantis said. “That’s why we’re hopeful that Nicosia’s Green Line will soon be dismantled.”

Fantis may be overly optimistic.

U.N.-sponsored reunification talks between Vassiliou and Rauf Denktash, president the Turkish Cypriots, have been deadlocked since June, 1989.

The Turkish Cypriots and Turkey have shown no recent signs of willingness to accept a two-zone federation proposed by the United Nations. Their position hardened after the Greek Cypriots applied for membership in the European Community a few months ago without consulting the ethnic Turks.

Glafcos Clerides, leader of the Democratic Rally, the main right-wing group among Greek Cypriots, said: “Separation on the basis of different political beliefs or communal differences belongs in the past. The new idea . . . is to do away with artificial divisions, like the one splitting Nicosia.”

The main obstacles to a settlement are the demand by Denktash for recognition of self-determination for the Turkish Cypriots and his refusal to implement U.N. resolutions.

Vassiliou rejects self-determination as tantamount to recognizing the separate republic.

To bolster his demands, Denktash forbids movement by Cypriots across the Green Line. A foreigner may cross only after signing a form recognizing the Turkish Cypriot state.

“The right of self-determination is not something we’re requesting from the Greeks,” Denktash said. “This right has been exercised. It exists and we won’t argue about it.”

He and other Turkish Cypriot leaders say Cyprus cannot be compared to Iraq’s seizure of Kuwait.

They say Turkey invaded to protect Turkish Cypriots and exercise its rights as a guarantor of the constitution under treaties that made Cyprus independent of Britain in 1960.