Varosha is a forbidden zone. The signs by the barbed-wire fence say so in five different languages. This has been a no-go area since the first paratroopers drifted down out of the early morning sunshine in the summer of 1974.

As the Turkish soldiers approached, residents of this Greek-Cypriot seaside town fled in their bell-bottom trousers, hastily packed bags under their arms. A mother held a child still blissfully asleep in a blanket. An elderly lady, dressed entirely in black, hobbled slowly with her walking stick as sporadic gunshots punctuated the crackling of automatic fire.

They left behind a thriving Mediterranean resort, the best beach on Cyprus, a glitzy playground for the rich and famous. After years of feuding between the island’s two communities led to a coup d’état inspired by Greece’s ruling military junta, Turkish troops occupied the north-eastern part of the island. One side talked of the liberation by Turkey, the other called it an invasion.

The inhabitants of Varosha still have hopes of one day returning home. Over the passing decades, both sides of the Cypriot ethnic divide have haggled over many issues, not least the ownership of land. Title deeds say the land was originally owned by Ottoman Turkish charitable foundations, but when Cyprus became a British crown colony in 1925, the Brits began selling parcels of Varosha real estate. Most were bought by Greek entrepreneurs.

Meanwhile, Varosha has become a ghost town, a time warp encased in dust. Through the fences, beyond the thicket of signs, abandoned hotels sit ragged and skeletal. Prickly pear bushes thrust through apartment walls and weeds rampage where the jet set once strolled. A car dealership still displays its grimy stock of 1974 models, while pockmarked mannequins dressed in outmoded fashions stare blankly from wrecked shop windows. But no one is sunbathing on Varosha’s golden sands.