Pyla, Cyprus - Sitting outside his home in the only bi-communal village in the buffer zone between northern and southern Cyprus, Yusuf Sakali says he hopes the election of newly elected Cypriot President Dimitris Christofias will at last bring peace to the divided island. "I have lived my whole life here and I hope that this latest election will at last bring about a quick solution to reunify the island," says 66-year-old Sakali, whose son runs a butcher shop in the village.
"We want a solution so that other Turkish Cypriots on the island can live like us here - in peace with the Greek Cypriots," he adds. Pyla is the only part of Cyprus where hundreds of Greek and Turkish Cypriots lived together long before the 1974 Turkish invasion, and have done so peacefully ever since.
At first glance, Pyla, with 1,100 Greeks and 500 Turks, resembles a typical Cypriot village, but a closer look shows that this is no ordinary town.
The Turkish coffee shop, "Pile Turk Hahvehanesi" and the Greek "Madeconia" coffee shop operate on either end of the main square and the skyline is dotted by an Orthodox church and the nearby minaret of the village mosque.
The population is split along roughly the same lines as the island itself, with about 67 per cent Greek Cypriots and 33 per cent Turkish Cypriots, policed by a civilian UN force and overlooked from the adjacent hills by Turkish army watchtowers.
A police force comprised of Irish and Australian officers is stationed in the village. If a Greek commits a crime, he is subject to Greek Cypriot law and officers come from nearby Larnaca to deal with him. If the suspect is Turkish, police come from the north to question him.
"We, all of us in this village, are an example of how Cyprus could be," says 73-year-old Theodoros Ioannou, adding that residents co-exist peacefully.
"We talk to each other and on a daily basis we have no problems. We work together and we are invited into each others homes."
Ioannou said that the two communities made a promise to each other that when the events of 1974 were unfolding they would remain united and that nothing would change. More than 35 years later they kept their promise.
Even when the majority of the Greek Cypriots voted "no" and Turkish Cypriots said "yes" in the 2004 referendum to reunite the island under a UN-backed peace plan there were no hard feelings among the villagers.
Since then, efforts to end the decade-old partition and reunite the two communities have been largely deadlocked.
"We voted no to the referendum but that does not mean that we voted no to reunification," says land developer Kostas Petros.
"We want a comprehensive solution that will meet the needs of both sides and it just happened that the Annan plan was not it," added Petros.
Hours after securing the Cyprus presidency, Christofias agreed to meet with Turkish Cypriot leader Mehmet Ali Talat for talks on possibly ending the division of the island.
Reports said that Talat called Christofias to congratulate him on his victory, and both men agreed to meet in the near future. No date has been set.
"Today the public spoke. There are many difficulties before us, but from tomorrow we unite our efforts to achieve the reunification of our country," Christofias said in his victory speech.
The election took place as United Nations mediators attempt to broker another peace plan by the end of the year.
The island has been divided since 1974, and Cyprus is represented by the Greek Cypriot government in the south, while the breakaway Turkish Cypriot north is recognized only by Ankara which maintains 30,000 troops there.
The ongoing conflict has been a thorn in relations between NATO allies Greece and Turkey and has served as an obstacle to Turkey?s efforts to join the European Union.
Stavros Stavrou, secretary of the Greek mayor's office known as the Pyla Village Council, says that while Pyla can be used as a model of peaceful co-existence, it is by no means a model for solving the Cyprus problem.
"Turkish Cypriots regard themselves as residents of the northern sector and refuse to pay taxes, water or hydro - thus Pyla is partially a model when it comes to living and working together. But as far as sharing the costs to make a better village, no."
The mayor of Pyla's Turks, Neket Enver, says that while no serious problems exist between the two communities in the village - Cyprus overall is not an easy problem and the new president will have to sit down and talk to Talat.
"Cyprus will have to become a partnership. We are hopeful that discussions will resume but there is no guarantee for a final solution."
