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One of the most surreal of sights in the UN buffer zone, or Green Line, which cuts a 110-mile swathe between the Turkish north and Greek south of Cyprus is Nicosia’s former international airport.

Abandoned during the 1974 intervention in the conflict between Greek and Turkish forces by the UN, it lies eerily empty, its check-in desks seemingly waiting to check phantom passengers on to non-existent flights.

Alan Thompson, who has visited the Green Line and spoken to Leicestershire soldiers serving with the Royal Lancers (Queen Elizabeths’ Own) in their UN peacekeeping role, reports.

A commercial airliner, which once flew passengers to the capitals of Europe and beyond, lies rusting and empty, stripped of its engine turbines.

Vegetation and wildlife have taken over large parts of the terminal building, five miles west of the Cypriot capital, swish seats in departure lounges are covered in pigeon droppings and kitchens and toilets have seen better days.

The airport was seized on behalf of the UN in 1974 by the 16th/5th Lancers, one of the former regiments amalgamated into the Royal Lancers, currently providing a UN peacekeeping role along the buffer zone in which the airport lies.

The remains of a Cyprus Airways Hawker-Siddeley Trident sits forlornly on the airport site .

All that is left is the shell of the aeroplane - the rest of the plane's key features were gutted years ago.

The airport, in the UN Protected Area, and used as a UN headquarters, is the base of the Royal Lancers Mobile Force Reserve, a quick-response, specially-trained squad ready to respond to any incidents of public order within the buffer zone.

The platoon, made up of more than 20 of the beefiest troopers and headed up by an officer, act on the direct orders of the Force Commander of United Nations Peacekeeping Force in Cyprus, Bangladeshi Major General Mohammad Humayan Kabir.

Lieutenant Rowan Callinan, 26, who commands the mobile force reserve, said: “Our primary role is public order.

"If there are violent protests between Turks and Greeks within the buffer zone our job is to intervene.

“There have been flash-points when things have happened before.

"We have riot shields and hickory sticks. Demonstrations tend to be announced so we become aware and some will alert the UN.

“We also do a lot of forward monitoring and using intelligence.

“We take all our kit and sit out of sight ready to go in if things get to a stage where the force commander would like us to be deployed.

"We do our public order training at the airport. It’s nice to be out and we feel like we’re doing something useful, essentially we’re specialists.”

Inside the airport the check in desks and luggage conveyor belts lie rusting and still.

Poster ads from the 1970s still hang from its walls.

It was a war zone which people left in a hurry.

The 16th/5th Lancers came in at the UN’s behest to prevent Turkish forces taking it over.

He added: "The airliner left on the runway has no turbines.

"Nature has begun to take over the terminal which has vegetation growing and is full of pigeon droppings.

"It was a new terminal which was only built two or three years before the invasion.

"I’m told there was a Michelin-starred restaurant in the terminal.”

Among the multi national troops serving in the blue berets of the UN, those guarding the airport are those from Argentina.

Lt Callinan added: “They’re good guys, the Argentinians, we get on really well with them.

"They run the guard room and security at the Blue Beret camp on the airport site, they’re pleasant to work with.

"There are also Slovakian and Hungarian engineers based there.”

With the ceasefire, signed on 16 August 1974, Nicosia Airport became part of the United Nations controlled Buffer Zone separating the two communities on the island, and it has been inoperable as a fully functioning airport ever since, although UN helicopters use the site.

From Monday we will be reporting on the 2nd Battalion, the Royal Anglian Regiment (The Poachers) based on the Cyprus coast as the rapid deployment battalion, ready to be sent at short notice anywhere in the Middle East or North Africa and protecting the air base from where British RAF jets launched a bombing mission on nearby Syria in April.