POLICE OFFICERS and firemen protested yesterday about their current timetable and in support of their colleague, police union representative Andreas Symeou.

The protest took place at 2:15 outside police headquarters and was attended by unions from the public and private sector as well as from a number of European countries.

A letter demanding the freedom to unionise was delivered for the attention of police Chief Michalis Papageorgiou.

Symeou fought against plans to reorganise the timetable for traffic police from a 12-hour shift to an eight-hour one, calling the schedule “inhuman” and staging protests when the scheme was introduced by Papageorgiou in July last year.

ANY EFFORT to move away from a bizonal, bicommunal federal solution would be tantamount to “attempted suicide”, President Demetris Christofias said yesterday.

Speaking in Limassol at the reburial of the remains of Andreas Kestas, killed during the July 1974 military coup against the government, Christofias said all previous presidents of the Republic since 1977 have accepted a solution based on a bizonal, bicommunal federation with political equality as set out by the UN Security Council resolutions.

“And not only would it be a historic mistake, it would be attempted suicide” to try now to move away from this commitment, he said.

ANY THREATS of war made over Cyprus’ sovereign right to exploit its underwater resources were “unacceptable and dangerous”, government spokesman Stefanos Stefanou said yesterday.

“It is the sovereign right of the Cyprus Republic to manage its own Exclusive Economic Zone, and any resources at its disposal. From there onwards, too much talk and threats even more so have no place on such a sensitive issue,” he said.

Stefanou was asked to comment yesterday on statements attributed to Turkish Cypriot leader Dervis Eroglu that were reported in Turkish Cypriot paper Vatan, where Eroglu reportedly warned that Greek Cypriot exploitation of their underwater natural resources would be considered a cause for war.

THE EUROPEAN Commission is funding an information campaign entitled Safe Food is Healthy Life, launched today on the occasion of Ecoday in Komi Kebir village in the north of the island.

According to a Commission press release, the campaign’s objective is two-fold: to inform the general public about the importance of food hygiene at home, schools and restaurants, and to increase awareness of rural communities and farmers about animal diseases, especially those that may be transmitted from animals to people.

A series of events will be held in schools, supermarkets and other venues in the north. Farmers and people living in rural areas will be informed about the importance of food hygiene and disease risks through talks given in village centres and coffee shops.

THE NUMBER of eligible voters registered in the Cyprus electoral roll has reached 531,136 while the number of polling stations is 1,203 with 17 that will operate overseas, a statement by the Electoral Service said.

The registered voters per district are:  Nicosia 191,517, Limassol 109,294, Famagusta 107,913, Larnaca 53,598, Paphos 40,534 and Kyrenia 28,280. A total of 89 enclaved in the Kyrenia district have a right to vote as well as 237 enclaved in the Famagusta district.

The number of polling stations that will operate per district are Nicosia 458, Limassol 352, Famagusta 54, Larnaca 193, Paphos 129.

NIGEL Connah always knew was adopted.

But until now he knew little about his family – least of all that his father was an APOEL legend, survived by three other children, one of them an eminent Cypriot musician.

Born in April 1954 in Sheffield, Nigel Connah began to trace his biological parents after his adoptive father passed away, and with a little help of a UK adoption agency, the Sunday Mail and old family friends, the emotional first meeting finally happened in Cyprus last week.