No one ever seems to see the same Archbishop Makarios, President of Cyprus. Those who have been involved in diplomatic negotiations find him baffling, enigmatic, and often infuriating. The 500,000 Greek Cypriots of his island home revere him as a guileless saint, a selfless patriot, and a tenderhearted humanitarian. The 100,000 Turkish Cypriots, a minority terrified of racial extinction, view him as a bloody-handed monster and "the devil of duplicity incarnate."
The man stirring up these contradictory emotions is a mystical prelate who leads an ascetic personal life. About the only ornament in his...