Akamas village calls for clean-up funds

The community leader of Neo Chorio, a village on the environmentally sensitive Akamas peninsula in Paphos, is asking for a special levy on visitors to help clean the area.

Speaking to the Cyprus News Agency, Andreas Christodoulou said the four-member council could not meet the increasing need for cleaning, especially in the summer season.

“Unfortunately, the largest section of visitors does not respect the environment,” he said.

Christodoulou said visitors left behind all sorts of rubbish, including chairs, barbeques and beds.

He urged the government to take measures to protect the area, including a special levy and increased policing “because if a fire breaks out the entire Akamas will burn and it will be too late”.

Covering about 230 square km, the Akamas is an area of great natural beauty mostly unaffected by development.

However, it has long been a sore point between the government, local residents, landowners, property developers and environmentalists.

Landowners and local residents argue that it is unfair not to allow them to develop what has become prime real estate, while conservationists counter that Akamas is one of the last truly beautiful natural spots in the government-controlled areas which is already under threat by the gradual encroachment of development.

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.