Updated

Cyprus has condemned plans by a group from the U.S.-based Biblical Archaeology Society to travel to the ethnically split island through its breakaway north.

Cyprus' Foreign Ministry said in a statement on its website Wednesday that the group's planned arrival on June 11 through Turkish-dominated north would breach Cypriot and international law and be "inconsistent with scholarly ethics." It appealed to the group to amend its itinerary.

Cyprus was divided in 1974 into a Greek speaking south and a Turkish speaking north in 1974 when Turkey invaded after a coup by supporters of union with Greece.

The Society's two-week trip to Turkey and Cyprus traces the footsteps of the Apostle Paul on his 1st century A.D. mission to spread Christianity in the region.