WHEN some three years ago the cops carried out a sting operation at a Strovolos massage parlour at which paid for sex was also being offered, the newspapers reported that the action was also caught on film.
CCTV had been installed in the room where the hanky-panky took place and the footage was saved on a computer in the office of the suspected pimp who was arrested together with his Russian wife and a young Moldovan woman.
Once the police had gone through the footage, they leaked to the press that state officials, unknowingly starred in what could be described as amateur porn videos. Needless to say, the names of the officials filmed showing off their sexual prowess, were never made public, because the cops would be guilty of violating personal data.
There was always the chance that we would find out which of our officials played the porn stars when the case went to trial at which the video could have used as evidence.
THE CASE went to court with a total of five charges being brought against the owner and his wife. These included living off immoral earnings, sexual exploitation and violation of personal data which was the more minor of the charges.
During the trial that took place last month, the prosecution proposed to show the video footage in order to prove the charge of personal data violation. Defence attorney Nasos Panayiotou objected to the screening of the video and wanted to have a trial within the trial to argue that it should not be shown.
Judge Charalambous, however, refused to go down this path and after some heated exchanges with the defence attorney, ruled that the video would be shown. Panayiotou sought a postponement to confer with his clients and when the trial resumed the judge was in for a big surprise.
The Attorney General’s office had, inexplicably, withdrawn the four serious criminal charges, leaving only the minor charge of violating personal data, to which the defendants pleaded guilty. As they had pleaded guilty there was no need to show the video in court and the trial was over.
The Judge, obviously angered by the prosecution’s decision to drop the serious charges, imposed a very harsh sentence – three months in prison – which was unheard of for a minor offence. There was an appeal which is being heard now.
THE MILLION dollar question here, was why had the Attorney General’s office agreed to withdraw the four serious charges, when the prosecution had such a strong case? Did the officials in the video have so much power they persuaded Petros Clerides to drop the criminal charges?
If, on the other hand, this was the type of deal the AG’s office cuts in order to get a sentence, it must staffed by total incompetents. What next? Dropping a murder charge in order to convict someone of parking illegally? It would not be a surprise.
Clerides can make these decisions without offering any justification to anyone. The defence attorney in the prostitution case is Clerides’ bosom buddy, but we know for certain that the AG would never allow his friendships to influence his professional decisions in any way.
There is a plausible explanation for his decision, which we will probably never hear.
I WAS Seriously considering giving up work this week and spend the rest if my days playing tavli, after reading Simerini’s banner headline about the ‘mythical treasure’ waiting for us under the Mediterranean Sea.
Its source was Turkish government documents that claimed the natural gas deposits in the Eastern Mediterranean amounted to 15 trillion cubic metres which was apparently worth seven trillion bucks. The amount was worth going to war over, the experts told the Turkish army, which, thankfully did not heed the advice. The Turks only go to war in order to protect ethnic minorities.
These zillions of cubic metres, according to the same documents, were in the Economic Exclusive Zones of Cyprus, Israel and Egypt, so if we got a third of cash we would have 2.3 trillion bucks. For a population of 800,000 this would mean almost 3 million bucks for every man, woman and child. (I have excluded illegal immigrants and political refugees from my calculations)
We will all be building even bigger houses, driving top of the range Mercs and Beemers, lighting our Havanas with 100-dollar bills, shopping for clothes in Prada and, most importantly, the poor old public parasites would not have to make any more painful sacrifices for the good of the economy.
Reading this, you will have guessed that I am still working, because we haven’t yet found a cubic metre of gas let alone the zillions. Poor old Aphrodite will have to be penetrated much harder and deeper by the Noble drill before we can have our life luxury and leisure.
OUR FREELOADER brothers in the north wasted no time in demanding a cut of our trillions, especially now that mama Turkey wants to reduce its annual hand-out to them.
Eroglu advisor Kudret Ozersay cited the 1960 treaties, which he and his bosses have always had great respect for, to press the TC claim for a piece of the action.
“The rights of the Turkish Cypriots do not only apply to the north, but all the sea areas. Everyone must understand that these rights of the Turkish Cypriots exist and derive from the agreements of 1960 for the establishment of the Cyprus Republic,” said Ozersay.
Our government, which until Tuesday was insisting that the TCs would share in our fabulous riches only after a settlement, suddenly changed its tune. From Wednesday the comrade president would tell anyone who would listen that if there was revenue from natural gas, the Turkish Cypriots would benefit even if there was no settlement.
He repeated this in his speech at the UN General Assembly while at his news conference that followed, he said there “are ways for the Turkish Cypriots to also get profited(sic),” and added: “I promise to the Turkish Cypriots that any profit will not be a profit exclusively for the Greek Cypriots.” The guarantee that he would keep his promise was “my history as a political fellow.”
Try using that to get a loan from a bank and it would call in the people with the straitjackets.
IT WAS a very smart move by the comrade political fellow, considering the soonest we are likely to get any cash from the natural gas will be in six to seven years, by which time, if there is a God above, he would not be president and have no access to the trillions.
Of course he made it seem that whatever happened, the TCs could always go to the generous comrade and he would take a couple of hundred euro notes from his pocket and give to them in order to shut them up.
What would he do if 10 Turkish tanks and 30 commandos turned up at his dacha in Kellaki demanding the millions he promised and personally guaranteed they would receive? He would give them two bags of lemons from his orchard and a jar of karydaki made by Elisavet, and tell them this was what he had in mind when he said the TCs would “also get profited.”
THE COMRADE presidente was in high spirits while in the Big Apple. All pictures sent from the US showed him smiling, laughing and playing the genial man about town; the body language was positive once again.
I think he also must have visited an expensive hairdresser in Manhattan because his hair no longer looked like a carpet on his head. It was stylishly cut and I would venture to guess that he also had it dyed with a silver tinge so it would not look too grandfatherly white. And it went very well with the shark-skin colour suit he wore.
A little more effort and he will have completely lost his mukhtar look. The sophisticated, new appearance was completely wasted when he tried to speak English, as those who watched his news conference at the UN on Thursday, would testify. You can watch his seminar on how speak appallingly poor En
glish at:
http://www.unmultimedia.org/tv/webcast/2011/09/press-conference-by-h-e-demetris-christofias.html
FOR THOSE who cannot be bothered, here are some of the highlights: “.. because Turkey after the solution of the Cyprus problem and Greece as well, will be both privileged countries, and they could in peaceful way as two sovereign states, the United Federal Republic of Cyprus and the Republic of Turkey, negotiate and co-operate in many fields, including in this field.”
This is what he had to say about Turkey’s agreement with the pseudo-state: “Turkey is now signing an agreement with a non-existing state, with an illegal international entity; this is why we say that Turkey once again violates the international law…”
About Turkey’s threats, he felt “we have enough hot crises in our region,” and with regard to Russia’s €2.5bn loan, “if you are a serious leadership, of course you have to close the agreement.”
He was particularly enlightening about his relationship with Big Bad Al. “Alexander Downer is Alexander Downer. He is doing his job, we follow. He controls us we control him. We are in a daily manner dialogue with Alexander Downer.”
The comrade, to his credit, is getting his own back on perfidious Albion by doing to the English language what English have done to Kyproulla over the years.
EVERYONE was eagerly waiting to see John Malkovich’s performance in The Infernal Comedy: Confessions of a Serial Killer last weekend, but the sold-out, one-off show at the Blind School Amphitheatre proved a bit of an organisational embarrassment.
The tickets stated clearly that entrances would close at 8.20 and that the performance would start at 8.30. At 8.45, while people were still coming in to take their seats, it was announced that seat numbers would not apply and people could seat wherever they wanted. There was a bit of a stampede for the front seats, but by 8.55 everyone was seated.
This was when the organisers, Dead Famous Productions, decided to show a 10-minute promotional video advertising the acts they had brought to Cyprus. Once the self-congratulatory video was over, a woman got on stage to thank all the sponsors, in four languages; this was when the crowd started booing and jeering, demanding the show started. Meanwhile, Malkovich could be seen at the edge of the stage impatiently waiting to start work.
The show started 45 minutes late. Fearing the high humidity would pose an occupational hazard, a rubber carpet was put on the stage floor, to stop the actors from slipping. This did not stop a young soprano from slipping and landing on her bottom. Malkovich, meanwhile, decided he would not be taking any risks so he took his shoes and socks off and performed bare-foot.
His dig at “the f**king Austrian organisers for not mopping the floor”, delivered in a German accent, was not a complaint, I was informed, but part of the script.
I CAME across an article published on August 27, by our establishment’s favourite book author and political moralist, Michalis Ignatiou, the other day. It reminded me that we are still awaiting the publication of his tell-all book, naming all the traitors who had taken the dirty dollars of the US to promote the satanic peace plan.
I am sad to report that Ig’s lawyers, who have been studying the book for the last three years have still not given the go-ahead for its publication.
ON AUGUST 27, Ig wrote in Phil that he was worried about info that the “weak-willed UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, under the pressure of Tayyip Erdogan, with whom he has a close friendship, would blackmail the Cyprus government that the talks procedure would be terminated if Nicosia went ahead with its energy plans.”
The wise author gave his personal view: “Personally, I did not have the slightest doubt that Ankara would have persuaded the people of the UN Secretariat, for the ‘need’ to blackmail Cyprus over the drilling… And the blackmail would be perpetrated in a way that would hurt Cyprus…”
It is not his fault he got everything wrong. The fortune-teller who normally reads his coffee-cup was out of town in August and he had to use a less reliable one.
