Once a Mediterranean playground for Hollywood stars, Varosha is now a no-go zone between Turkish and Greek communities Famagusta-Varosha in Cyprus once drew Hollywood stars such as Paul Newman and Elizabeth Taylor to its beaches. There were more than 100 hotels, 5,000 houses and businesses, museums, churches and schools here, but today they stand rotting and empty behind barbed wire. They have been deserted and fenced off since a July 1974 war that split the island and made Varosha, part of the ancient port town of Famagusta, a no-go zone. Mindful of UN resolutions barring resettlement, Turkey fenced off the 2.3 square mile area of Varosha and abandoned it. But, recently, and with Cyprus this month taking on the EU's six-month rotating presidency, both sides have mooted reopening Varosha and its white-sand beaches, to help break a deadlock in UN-backed reunification talks.