Thrassou: we didn’t pressure US court on Helios suit

COMMUNICATIONS Minister Harris Thrassou yesterday denied reports he had attempted to persuade a US court to reject the Helios Relatives’ Victims Committee’s request to file lawsuits against Boeing and Helios in America.

The claim had been made in Phileleftheros, which reported that the minister had written to the US court, with the Attorney-general’s authority, telling it that the government had no objection to the case being tried outside America.

But Thrassou said what he had written had been quite the opposite.
“We sent a letter saying that we had no objection to having the case tried in the United States,” he said.

Thrassou made public the letter he’d sent to the Chicago court. It read: “We do not have any objection for the trial to take place in the courts of the USA.”
The minister said he had also been in contact with the newspaper to clear up the misunderstanding.

On Thursday, the Helios Relatives’ Victims Committee learned that its request to file lawsuits against Boeing and Helios with a Chicago court had been rejected because, according to the decision, the US had no authority to examine such a claim.
The court said the relatives could receive justification just as satisfactorily in Greece or Cyprus.

Committee chairman Nicholas Yiasoumis said the development was “negative” and that he had believed the court would have the authority to try the case.
“We sought compensation in the US because we believed things would have been easier there and this way we would have helped those orphaned from the tragedy,” Yiasoumis said.

Yiasoumis said the relatives were concerned that that those responsible for the August 2005 air crash had not been held responsible and urged the Attorney-general and state prosecution to move forward with their suits.

He also said the committee was examining the possibility of claims in both Cyprus and Greece, as well as appealing the US court decision.
On August 14, 2005, a Boeing 737 Helios Airways flight bound for Athens from Larnaca crashed in Grammatikos, Greece killing all 121 people on board.

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.