Demba Ba made an instant impact with two goals on his Chelsea debut as the holders romped to an emphatic 5-1 victory at Southampton in the FA Cup third round on Saturday.
CYPRUS star Marcos Baghdatis fought back from a set and a break down to force a decider, but was eventually narrowly beaten by Bulgarian rising star Grigor Dimitrov 3-6 7-5 6-7 in the semi-finals of the Brisbane International on Saturday.
Dimitrov will now take on Britain’s Andy Murray after the US Open and Olympic champion eased into Sunday’s final when his opponent Kei Nishikori retired.
THE AIR smells of smoke: olive wood. Late into the night tractors laden with hessian sacks make their way to brightly illuminated village presses. The fine weather over New Year has rallied all to the fields to harvest the green gold. For in Messinia, there is no space, no matter how hard to reach or unpromisingly small, that cannot support an olive tree. It’s the time of year when city boys return from Athens to their grandparents smallholdings. They’ll be pleased that if Samaras, the Peloponnesian, achieves nothing else, the new motorway joining Athens airport to Kalamata has cut the journey in half, to around two hours. Even so, there are not enough hands to help, without the migrant ones of Albanians and Romanians and, as in our small town, British.
THE RESPONSE of the government and AKEL to the interview given on Sigma TV by the former Central Bank governor Athanasios Orphanides was the predictable one. Spokesman Stefanos Stefanou described the interview as “a nauseating crescendo”, accusing Orphanides of “re-emerging with the well-known lies and well-known wretchedness against the president, the government and AKEL.”
AS OF Monday police will start checking everyone leaving Cyprus through the island’s airports for those who have until now dodged paying fines or other outstanding payments to the state or courts, and those who don’t pay up will be arrested, police said yesterday.
Members of the public, among them politicians, lawyers and prominent individuals, collectively owe the state €135 million in penalties, fines, overdue alimony payments, social insurance, and taxes.
The police chief has warned that people would be made to pay “whoever they are.”
From Monday a month-long trial period involving checks, arrests, and payment collections at airports will begin.
PETROL station owners yesterday called off an indefinite Cyprus-wide strike after the interior minister agreed to review and impose stricter restrictions on licences for new stations.
The petrol station owners want to restrict the number of petrol stations – they say there are over 300 – so they can remain viable.
On Thursday afternoon they announced an all-out indefinite strike, after their peers in the Famagusta district shut down shop because a licence was issued for a new petrol station on the Paralimni-Ayia Napa road. Motorists formed queues to fill up their tanks on Thursday night but operators stopped their plans yesterday afternoon, when Interior Minister Eleni Mavrou met with them and agreed to review 29 licences issued over the past two years.
THE jobless rate jumped 26.5 per cent year-on-year in December, reaching 41,625 people, the statistical service said yesterday.
Based on the seasonally adjusted data that show the trend of unemployment, the number of registered unemployed for December 2012 rose to 40,184 persons compared with 39,116 the previous month.
The annual rise was mainly observed in the sectors of trade – 1,960 people — accommodation and food service activities, 1,506, construction, 1,440, manufacturing, 755, and public administration, 519.
Unemployment also rose among newcomers in the labour market where an increase of 674 people was recorded.
CENTRAL Bank Governor Panicos Demetriades will on Monday meet the ambassadors of eurozone member-states in a bid to convince them of his determination to consolidate the island’s financial sector.
Reports said the issue of money laundering will also be discussed in light of recent foreign media reports.
There have been several articles in the German press recently with European politicians expressing concern over handing bailout money to Cyprus when there were question marks over Russian money and allegations of money laundering.
RECORD numbers of birds have flocked to Cyprus’ wetlands this winter as their migration patterns have coincided with extensive rainfall over the months of September and October according to the Game and Fauna Fund.
“Around 20,000 flamingos were recorded in Cyprus during December which is a record and we also saw between 15,000 and 16,000 flamingos recorded in November which is also a record,” senior member of the Game and Fauna Fund, Nikos Kassinis said yesterday.
INTERIOR MINISTER Eleni Mavrou yesterday officially proclaimed February 17 as the date of the presidential elections.
If none of the candidates garner more than 50 per cent of the vote, then a second round is scheduled for a week later on February 24.
The minister yesterday also appointed the Chief Returning Officer Andreas Assiotis and the rest of the Returning Officers in Cyprus’ election districts and abroad.
According to a decree published in the official gazette, Mavrou has set January 18 as the date for presidential contesters to submit their candidacies.
So far, nine people have announced their intention to run in February’s elections.
The incumbent, President Demetris Christofias, will not seek re-election.
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.
