Besieged gunman boasted he brought France to its knees

2012-03-21

A besieged gunman suspected of shooting dead seven people in the name of al Qaeda boasted to police on Wednesday he had brought France to its knees and said his only regret was not having been able to carry out his plans for more killings.

In an unfolding drama that has riveted France, about 300 police, some in body armour, cordoned off a five-storey building in a suburb of Toulouse where the 24-year-old Muslim shooter, identified as Mohamed Merah, is holed up.

Authorities said the gunman, a French citizen of Algerian origin, had been to Pakistan and Afghanistan, where he claimed to have received training from al Qaeda.

Somali pirates free British hostage

2012-03-21

Somali pirates freed British hostage Judith Tebbutt on Wednesday, saying a ransom had been paid, more than six months after gunmen killed her husband and snatched her from a luxury beach resort in neighbouring Kenya.

Tebbutt’s kidnapping and the subsequent abductions of other foreigners prompted Kenya to send hundreds of troops into Somalia in October to try to crush the al Qaeda-linked al Shabaab militants that Nairobi blamed for the attacks.

“After efforts today, we have succeeded in the release of the British woman,” Omar Mohammed Diirey, a regional official, told Reuters from Adado in central Somalia.

Britain cuts income tax, austerity drive undimmed

2012-03-21

British finance minister George Osborne cut the top rate of income tax while imposing new levies on the wealthy, in a political high wire act designed to rejig the burden of austerity without wavering on plans to erase a huge budget deficit.

Britain should avoid a renewed recession and while the recovery was set to remain modest this year, growth should pick up thereafter, Osborne told parliament in his annual budget statement on Wednesday.

A sometimes uneasy coalition government of centre-right Conservatives and more left-wing Liberal Democrats has made erasing a huge budget deficit – which topped 11 percent of GDP before it took office – within the next five years its core objective, and the latest forecasts showed it remained on track.

Christofias: criticism of me is a democratic right…but

2012-03-21

 

Players in the international community, and specifically the EU, want to see the re-election of President Demetris Christofias, he said today during his annual televised press conference on the status of the Cyprus issue.

These international players tell Christofias they cannot imagine the Republic of Cyprus without his presidency, he told reporters in answer to a question on whether he would run again as president next year.

Christofias also said that while criticism of him was a democratic right, “at the same time democracy means respecting the Constitution and official institutions “by those who criticise.

Cyprus will seek EU approval to reduce VAT on electricity bills

2012-03-21

 

IN AN apparent change of heart, the administration said yesterday it plans to ask the European Union’s consent to lower the VAT levied on electricity here from 17 to 8 per cent.

Less than a month ago, the government said there was no chance of that happening.

But during a session of the House Commerce Committee yesterday, Finance Ministry officials told MPs that the government would be requesting a consultation with the EU VAT Committee to discuss the matter.

It’s understood that the government’s proposal for a lower VAT rate applies to domestic users only.

‘This would reduce electricity bills for consumers by around 10 per cent,” said Commerce Committee chairman Lefteris Christoforou.

Our View: Cabinet reshuffle theatre reflects badly on president

2012-03-21

IN THE end, the mini-reshuffle of the cabinet turned into farce, with the President and the outgoing Commerce and Industry Minister Praxoulla Antoniadou in dispute over whether she had been sacked or had resigned.

Ms Antoniadou insisted she had never resigned, forcing the government spokesman to release a letter she had been sent on March 14 by the president in which he stated that he had received her resignation in a telephone conversation. He also reprimanded her for failing “after so many days” to submit her resignation “officially and in writing.” 

‘Super minister’ takes over at commerce ministry

2012-03-21

NEW ministers of Interior and Commerce were sworn in yesterday under the shadow of the ongoing spat between the government and outgoing minister Praxoulla Antoniadou.

President Demetris Christofias yesterday welcomed former Interior Minister Neoclis Sylikiotis to his new position replacing Antoniadou as Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism, along with former Nicosia Mayor Eleni Mavrou, who replaces Sylikiotis.

The president spoke of a “renewal” of cabinet, giving it the required impetus to continue the government’s work smoothly and effectively.

Public service shrinks by…two people

2012-03-21

THE SIZE of the broader public sector shrank last year by a grand total of…two people.

The Department of Statistics yesterday released data on the total number of people employed in the central government and the broader civil service in 2011.

The number of civil servants employed at the end of the quarters of 2011 were: 70,782; 72,322; 70,898; and 72,208.

At the end of Q4 of the previous year (2010), the number of civil servants stood at 72,210 – two more than at the end of Q4 2011.

The government had pledged to reduce the size of the public sector by some 1,000.

The bulk of civil servants work for the central government, where 58,673 persons were employed at the end of Q4 2011.

Overtime row crippling parts of public service

2012-03-21

THE Finance Ministry is preparing legislation that aims to restore some calm to the public sector by changing (again) the way in which overtime pay is calculated.

Under a government bill incorporated into the 2012 budget, public-sector employees are paid an overtime rate which is based on the lowest pay grade in a given service – a significant departure from past practice, when civil servants were paid a rate analogous to their actual pay grade.

This came about as a result of an amendment to the bill that was pushed through by legislators who, although motivated by a desire to make cutbacks to the budget, admit they may have acted too zealously in this particular case.

Cypriot channels can’t afford to show Formula 1

2012-03-21

NO LOCAL channels will be showing this season’s Formula 1 racing, including subscription LTV, as none could afford to purchase the screening rights, it has emerged.

According to an official at the Cyprus Radiotelevision Authority, even though there is a list of events that should by law be shown on terrestrial TV that includes Formula 1, it is currently under reform.

Furthermore, even if it is obligatory to show the event, the authority can’t force the stations to buy the rights.

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.