The search for Cyprus’ missing goes high-tech as time weighs on loved ones waiting for closure

By MENELAOS HADJICOSTIS
Associated Press

EXO METOCHI, Cyprus (AP) — Clues about hundreds of Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots who disappeared in the clashes during the 1960s and the 1974 Turkish invasion are becoming more scarce. Many witnesses to the events are no longer living. Officials now hope new, high-tech equipment can help save time and money in the search for the missing. A powerful ground-penetrating radar is being tested in the ethnically-divided island nation to probe locations that witnesses say could be burial sites. A professor at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and his son are volunteering their time to test the radar so that Cyprus’ Committee on Missing Persons can purchase its own and hopefully avoid costly and time-consuming excavations that may yield no results.