UNFICYP is looking at doubling the capacity of its bicommunal telephone exchange to cope with the soaring demand for calls across the Green Line.

A FILIPINO man died yesterday in a blaze that broke out in a Limassol restaurant shortly after midnight.

Police said they found 45-year-old Hilario Gamid unconscious in the bathroom, apparently from smoke inhalation.

He was rushed to Limassol hospital but to no avail as doctors pronounced him dead.

A NICOSIA man was killed yesterday in what is thought to have been a game of Russian roulette.

Police found 21-year-old Christos Paphios at 6am, lying in a pool of blood at his house on Andreas Demetriou Street in Dasoupolis.

BICOMMUNAL contacts appear to be back with a vengeance, and, according to the UN, this is down to Greek and Turkish Cypriots’ desire "to get to know each other as people."

THE CYPRUS stock exchange headed south yesterday on thin volumes that kept buyers and sellers at bay, with the market trading rangebound for the near-term.

The benchmark index trimmed 6.58 points from Friday’s close to settle at 608.43 on a traded value of £17.3 million, £2.5 million higher than Friday but still comparatively low.

AKEL AND Disy yesterday agreed to disagree on Disy’s proposal for changes in parliamentary election laws, with Akel insisting that the system should remain as it is.

IT COULD be viewed as a cautionary tale. How a momentary lapse caused a Nicosia restaurateur days of agonized searching for a customer he did not want to disappoint.

THE government yesterday said it had protested to the United States about certain aspects of the latest State Department human rights report section on Cyprus.

The protest was conveyed to US ambassador in Cyprus Donald Bandler by Foreign Minister Yiannakis Cassoulides at a meeting yesterday.

IN AN attempt to play down media hysteria about alleged British spying against Cyprus, Foreign Minister Yiannakis Cassoulides yesterday reminded reporters that “Cyprus is not the epicentre of this issue, nor is it the centre of the Earth”.

THE United Nations chief envoy for Cyprus, Alvaro de Soto, will pay his first visit to the island this week.

After he arrives on Tuesday, De Soto will visit both the Republic and the occupied areas before departing around March 7.