The Port of Limassol is the largest

port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as H ...

Cyprus Cyprus ; tr, Kıbrıs (), officially the Republic of Cyprus,, , lit: Republic of Cyprus is an island country located south of the Anatolian Peninsula in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Its continental position is disputed; while it is ge ...

, located in the city of

Limassol Limassol (; el, Λεμεσός, Lemesós ; tr, Limasol or ) is a city on the southern coast of Cyprus and capital of the district with the same name. Limassol is the second largest urban area in Cyprus after Nicosia, with an urban population ...

Location

The port is located in the Eastern Mediterranean and is considered one of the busiest ports in the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western Europe, Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa ...

transit trade.

Importance

Limassol's New Port is now the principal seaport of the island. This was largely a direct result of the

Turkish invasion of Cyprus The Turkish invasion of Cyprus began on 20 July 1974 and progressed in two phases over the following month. Taking place upon a background of intercommunal violence between Greek and Turkish Cypriots, and in response to a Greek junta-s ...

in 1974 leaving the

Port of Famagusta The Port of Famagusta is a seaport in Famagusta, Cyprus. There is a free zone ("Famagusta Free Zone") in the port. The port is under the ''de facto'' control of Northern Cyprus. The ports of Northern Cyprus are not registered to the International ...

within occupied territory and inaccessible to

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

Cypriots. Cyprus is an established player in the

shipping industry Maritime transport (or ocean transport) and hydraulic effluvial transport, or more generally waterborne transport, is the transport of people ( passengers) or goods (cargo) via waterways. Freight transport by sea has been widely used thro ...

. The city of Limassol is a centre for numerous global shipping companies. Most of the island’s cargo (importation and exportation) is also handled in this port. In the year 2000, 3,589,000 tonnes of cargo were handled whilst there were roughly 1 million passenger arrival and departures (>90% of total traffic). Over 50 international cruise liners include Cyprus in their

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ...

routes resulting in much of the passenger traffic.

Operations

The port is capable of handling vessels up to size for berthing in of water. It is entered through an approach channel which is deep and wide between the ends of two breakwaters. In 2016 the port has been privatized to a consortium led by Eurogate International for the container terminal, while DP World will be the operator for multipurpose passenger terminal.

Humanitarian Hub

The port has served numerous times as an evacuation point for refugees fleeing from conflict in the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...

. Most recently hundreds of thousands of EU and other citizens were evacuated from

Lebanon Lebanon ( , ar, لُبْنَان, translit=lubnān, ), officially the Republic of Lebanon () or the Lebanese Republic, is a country in Western Asia. It is located between Syria to Lebanon–Syria border, the north and east and Israel to Blue ...

Limassol Old Port

Limassol Old Port used to be the main port of Limassol, between its construction (in its current form) in 1956 up until the delivery of the Limassol New Port in 1973. Its original foundations were laid during the

British Cyprus British Cyprus was the island of Cyprus under the dominion of the British Empire, administered sequentially from 1878 to 1914 as a British protectorate, from 1914 to 1925 as a unilaterally annexed military occupation, and from 1925 to 1960 as a ...

in the late 19th century. Up to and including 1974, the British

RAF The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the United Kingdom's air and space force. It was formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, becoming the first independent air force in the world, by regrouping the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and ...

1153 Marine Craft Unit (MCU) was stationed in the western part of the harbor. It now serves as a leisure, fishing boat and

coast guard A coast guard or coastguard is a maritime security organization of a particular country. The term embraces wide range of responsibilities in different countries, from being a heavily armed military force with customs and security duties to ...

shelter. Following an architectural competition, plans have been drawn up to revamp the area and transform it into a more functional leisure center.''£10 million face-lift for old Limassol port - Cyprus Mail archive article - Thursday, February 23, 2006

For that reason the Old Port had been officially closed and the project commenced after some delays under the name Limassol Marina in 2010.

References

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