‘We do not have airport police shortage’

POLICE officials yesterday dismissed claims there was a shortage of police at the island’s airports.

Yesterday’s Phileleftheros claimed there were significant security flaws at the airport and a lack of communication between the police and the Civil Aviation Authorities (CAA). The article was sparked by the recent escapade of a man who drove his car onto the Larnaca Airport taxiway and caused panic for 20 minutes at the airport. The ease with which this happened seriously dented the credibility of security measures and caused embarrassment to the authorities at a time when security at airports on the island is being constantly monitored by international agencies.

Yesterday, the paper said the gate, through which the man had driven, was still left unguarded, adding it was sometimes be left unguarded for as long as ten hours.

According to sources quoted by Phileleftheros, police officials confessed during a top-level meeting last Monday that they simply didn’t have enough manpower to put guards at all the gates of the airport.

The paper said the central gate at the airport was left open last Tuesday, another entrance area was left simply unguarded and another gate sealed off with barbed wire.
However, Police Spokesman Demetris Demetriou told the Cyprus Mail that the claims regarding manpower as well as the unguarded airport gates were simply not true and there was a sufficient number of officers present at the airport at all times.

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.