THE GOVERNMENT has made plans to erect a desalination plant in Paralimni in the Famagusta district as soon as there is a solution to the Cyprus problem, Agriculture Minister Costas Themistocleous said yesterday.
The land had already been mapped out and the plant would cover the entire Famagusta area, he said. In the event of a solution, this would be even more necessary due to increased tourism numbers with the reopening of Varosha.
If there were a solution, Cyprus’ natural resources would “be made available to all the island’s residents, irrespective of which area they live in or their religion,” said Themistocleous.
The UN settlement proposal states that “natural resource matters will remain in the component state and not become part of the common state”.
But the Minister expressed the conviction that if both communities were willing to transfer natural resource concerns under one common state, Cyprus could solve its long standing water problem for many years to come, which would in turn benefit both Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots.
“A country’s water resources and natural resources in general should benefit all its residents,” he said, adding that the Republic had already irreversibly solved its drinking water problem, whereas the Turkish Cypriots faced a much “worse fate”.
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.
