THE GOVERNOR of the Central Bank yesterday warned the fiscal deficit would rise beyond government forecasts this year unless state income could be increased and spending controlled. Christodoulos Christodoulou ruled out devaluing the pound, but hinted at higher interest rates in the new year and urged the government to crack down on tax evasion to boost state coffers.
ALITHIA: “Ankara holds the key to unlocking Cyprus problem” The daily led with highlights from the Europa Forum conference held in Berlin, where EU Enlargement Commissioner Guenter Verheugen said it was unreasonable to expect EU accession negotiations with Turkey to begin with the Cyprus problem unsolved.
AROUND 400 students yesterday staged a peaceful demonstration outside the US embassy in Nicosia to mark the 30th anniversary of the student uprising against the American-backed Junta in Greece. At least 23 people died and hundreds were wounded when tanks stormed the Polytechnic campus on November 17, 1973.
A NEW kind of art auction is aiming to raise money for charity while giving artists an opportunity to display their work. The first was held at the weekend at the municipal library in Limassol. Half of all the money raised was for the Theotokos Foundation for the children with special needs.
IN LESS than one hour, five separate accidents involving 14 cars occurred on the Nicosia-Limassol highway on Sunday, according to traffic police. As the multitude of cars rushed to avoid the end-of-weekend traffic, between 5.40pm and 6.30pm, police recorded four two-car accidents and a six-car pile up.
TURKISH Cypriot administration sources yesterday insisted a proposal by Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash to form a national congress was not geared to sideline the powers of the Turkish Cypriot ‘parliament’, adding the plan was in any case still far from being finalised.
THE GOVERNMENT said yesterday it had still not decided on the timing of new fuel price hikes, which it described as “inevitable”. Rising crude oil prices means the state budget has to be compensated by more expensive fuel at the pump, the government insists.
FORMER president Lyndon B. Johnson is only a black-and-white sound-bite in History Channel documentaries for the most of today’s audience, but John F. Kennedy, who preceded him as president, still lives in the public memory on both sides of the Atlantic forty years after he was shot on November 22, 1963. The question is: do we just remember him because of the manner of his death?
SECONDARY school students were aimlessly wondering through the streets of central Nicosia again yesterday. It was the second school day in succession that they had been allowed to leave their classrooms in order to attend a so-called political protest.
A BRITISH soldier was killed late on Saturday in an accident during a military exercise just outside the village of Sotira near Episkopi, the British military said yesterday. Private James Parkinson, 26, a driver with the 44 Squad Royal Logistic Corps, was in Cyprus to take part in the “Winter Victory” two-week annual exercise by the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.
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.
