Green Party files objection to tree felling for Easter bonfires

THE GREEN party yesterday issued a call to local government departments, but also to private citizens, to report illegal tree felling to the police.

“Vandals are this year also uprooting perennial trees and cutting down forest trees, or olive and carob trees on agricultural land, to burn them in the Easter lambrajia,” the statement said.

The Greens called on the forestry department to carry out a public awareness campaign designed to educate the public on the massive damage which is caused to the “natural heritage” of the island by the cutting down of perennial trees, groves and other protected trees for the annual national custom of the Easter bonfire.

They also called on police to increase their patrols in the lead-up to Easter to help prevent the illegal cutting down of trees.

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.