CY could collapse by April

2011-02-22

 

CYPRUS Airways (CY) could shut down by April at the latest, if parliament fails to approve the €20 million earmarked as compensation from Turkey’s ban on its airspace, Finance Minister Charilaos Stavrakis warned yesterday.

But the news was even bleaker. Even if the funds were approved, said the minister, there were no guarantees that CY had a future, with negative ramifications for the economy in general and CY’s some thousand employees in particular.

OUR VIEW: Parties’ ploy to show up the government is likely to backfire

2011-02-22

FOUR parliamentary parties submitted a draft decision to the House last Thursday that envisaged Cyprus applying for membership of Partnership for Peace (PfP). The draft, put together on the initiative of DISY, aims to by-pass the government’s well-known and oft-repeated opposition to membership of the Partnership, which is directly linked to NATO.

The four parties – DISY, EDEK, DIKO and EUROKO – have been calling on the government to apply for membership for some time now, but have met with a flat rejection as President Christofias, faithfully adhering to his fanatical anti-NATO position. PfP has always been described as a ‘waiting room’ for NATO membership by Akel and therefore was a no-go area for Cyprus.

How Libya’s uprising differs from Bahrain’s

2011-02-22

Watching the extraordinarily rambling and repetitive speech by Colonel Moammar Gaddafi’s 38-year-old second son, Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, on Libyan television on Sunday night, I couldn’t help being struck by how ignorant the man was.

According to Saif, the protests in Libya are the work of drunks, criminals and foreigners who had been paid to destabilise the Libyan state. (“At this time drunks are driving tanks in central Benghazi.”) If everybody does not rally around the regime, there will be a terrible civil war. (“We are a tribal people.”) The country will break into a dozen separate emirates, all foreign investors will leave  and the oil will cease to flow.

Foreign Ministry monitoring Cypriot citizens

2011-02-22

NO CYPRIOTS have yet asked to be repatriated, said the foreign ministry yesterday, but the Greek Foreign Minister, Demetris Droutsas said Greece has two aircraft on stand-by to repatriate any Greeks or Cypriots.

Around 160 Cypriots currently reside in Libya.

“There is no problem with safety at the moment,” said Andreas Zinonos, director of crisis management at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “So far we are not going to begin repatriating people but if someone wants to leave they can,” added Zinonos.

Famagusta club leads fight against hooliganism

2011-02-22

 

ANORTHOSIS FC yesterday announced a string of measures aimed at containing hooliganism at the club’s Larnaca venue, including the immediate hiring of stewards and the establishment of a task force to ensure football games pass without incident.

At a news conference yesterday, the Famagusta club said they were teaming up with police to enforce stricter stadium regulations at the “Antonis Papadopoulos” ground.

The club said it would be forming a task force comprising former senior police officers and experts on hooliganism. It objectives: to hire and provide training to stewards; to formulate an action plan for each home game, in cooperation with the police; and the constant monitoring of matches in cooperation with stadium authorities.

Court told of complex underworld backdrop to Hadjicostis murder

2011-02-22

A DEFENCE lawyer in the ongoing murder trial of media owner Andis Hadjicostis yesterday again sought to attack the credibility of a prosecution witness.

Witness Giorgos Zavrantonas is currently serving a 12-year prison term at an unspecified location for attempting to kill Andreas Gregoriou, one of the defendants in the case, and conspiring to murder five people involved in online gambling in a case unrelated to Hadjicostis’ murder in January 2010.

Zavrantonas has previously implicated Gregoriou, and co-defendants television presenter Elena Skordelli, 42 and her brother Tasos Krasopoulis, 37, in Hadjicostis’ murder.

Peaceful return for absent Palestinian students

2011-02-22

Arabic-speaking students at Larnaca’s Vergina Lyceum peacefully returned to school yesterday, following a brawl last week between Greek Cypriot and Palestinian pupils which left four children with minor injuries.

The high school was turned into a battleground last Wednesday when pupils from as-yet-unnamed other schools joined forces with around 100 of the Lyceum’s children to launch an apparently unprovoked attack against around 15 of their Arabic-speaking classmates.

The fracas was said to be connected to a recent attack by Palestinian refugees on Larnaca’s welfare office for delaying their benefit cheques, resulting in an intervening policeman being injured.

Knock-on effect of Arab crisis on tourism

2011-02-22

THE CHAIRMAN of the Cyprus Tourism Organisation (CTO) yesterday said there was real danger of local tourism being diversely affected by the crisis in the Arabic world, during discussions on the organisation’s 2011 budget.

CTO chairman Alekos Oroundiotis told the House Finance Committee he feared the crisis could have an effect on the general image of eastern Mediterranean countries.

“We are more concerned about the crisis in the Arabic world than allowing ourselves to be optimistic about an increase in tourist flow to Cyprus,” said Oroundiotis.

Targeted cancer drugs can double survival rate

2011-02-22

CANCER patients undergoing chemotherapy can now double their survival chance with individualised drug treatment but it might be a while before the method is widely used in Cyprus, doctors say.

This is good news given that one in three of us will develop cancer and one in four will die from it, according to local oncologist Pavlos Drakos talking yesterday at a press conference by the Greek Institute for Medical Research and Education.

Patients with special needs should not be in hospital

2011-02-22

A NUMBER of mentally handicapped patients should be immediately transferred out of a psychiatric ward and placed under the care of the Welfare Services, a DISY MP has said.

There are currently 17 adult patients with special needs, residing in ward 14 of the Athalassa Hospital outside Nicosia.

According to DISY’s Stella Kyriakidou, this is a violation of their human rights.

An evaluation committee has ruled that 12 out of these patients should not be housed at a psychiatric facility and recommended they be moved to more suitable premises.

“These patients should not be institutionalised,” Kyriakidou noted.

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.