THE ATTORNEY-general has given the go ahead for the Central Bank to hand over the accounts of seven Yugoslav offshore companies to the Chief Prosecutor of the war crimes tribunal in The Hague.
Following reports in yesterday’s Phileleftheros, sources at the Central Bank said the green light had been given to pass on the details to Chief Prosecutor Carla del Ponte.
Last October, the Cabinet froze the accounts of 12 companies operating in Cyprus suspected of links with former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.
The sources said that the individual banks would either make the information available to The Hague directly, or someone would come from abroad to collect the files. The issue had to pass through the Attorney-general’s office due to the island’s banking secrecy laws.
The development does not indicate any guilt on the part of the companies involved, just the government’s willingness to comply with Del Ponte’s request, the sources said.
Del Ponte paid a brief visit to the island at the beginning of October as part of a tour of countries in the region to gather information about 38 suspected associates of Milosevic.
When she visited the island requesting the information, the government immediately complied by freezing the accounts.
Rumours have abounded for years that Milosevic channelled $100 million in funds through various countries, including Cyprus, but the government and Central Bank have consistently denied that the island was involved.
The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.
