Four computers were stolen from a shop on Faneromeni Avenue in Larnaca during the early hours yesterday, police said.
According to reports, at around 4am police received a call from the shop owner that someone had set off the alarm system.
The burglar or burglars broke in from the shop’s side door police said.
The value of the computers has yet to be estimated.
By Elias Hazou
THE SUPREME Court ordered on Monday the extradition of former interior minister Dinos Michaelides to Greece for questioning related to corruption charges.
Michaelides, 75, would be the first Cypriot government or former government official to be extradited to Greece, where authorities want to question him as part of a graft inquiry against Akis Tsohatzopoulos.
Tsohatzopoulos, a founding member of Greece’s socialist PASOK party, is facing charges of accepting kickbacks for arms contracts when he was defence minister. He denies the charges.
Greek prosecutors allege Tsohatzopoulos siphoned funds overseas. They say one of his co-defendants has alleged that Michaelides helped Tsohatzopoulos set up bank accounts, and that they want to question the former Cypriot minister about that.
Michaelides denies any wrongdoing.
He served as interior minister in two governments, the second stint in the late 1990s, and has since maintained a legal practice.
Greek authorities issued an arrest warrant against Michaelides when he failed to respond to a summons to appear in an Athens court earlier this year.
His lawyers had fought the extradition, appealing against a district court’s verdict which said he had to go to Greece. Among other things, they argued that the media coverage and public statements on the affair had prejudiced the lower court’s decision.
However the Supreme Court upheld the previous ruling and Michaelides has no further right of appeal. The court said he must be extradited within 10 days.
Both Michaelides and his son Michalis are wanted in Greece in connection with alleged kickbacks paid in the purchase by Greece of Russian TOR-M1 surface-to-air missile systems.
The former minister is to remain in custody at the Central Prisons until he is extradited on a European arrest warrant.
A senior state prosecutor stressed that despite the ruling here, Michaelides is a suspect in Greece and is presumed innocent until proven otherwise.
Calling yesterday’s court ruling a ‘landmark decision’, Justice Minister Ionas Nicolaou affirmed that the government would comply with the Greek extradition request within the set deadline.
Nicolaou said the decision is important because it paves the way for a quid pro quo between Cypriot and Greek authorities.
Nicosia now expects that Athens will in turn positively consider future requests for the extradition of Greek citizens to Cyprus, he added.
Nicolaou revealed that the government intends to seek extradition of Greek nationals to be questioned here for cases connected to the near-bankruptcy of Cypriot banks.
“Such cases will come about in the near future. There exist actions that have occurred in Greece and in which Greek citizens took part,” he said, without elaborating.
A major criminal probe is underway into what caused Cyprus’ economic meltdown. The investigation covers the period 2006 to 2013, and its scope encompasses the transfer of capital from Laiki Bank to Greece, dodgy loans, the issuing of securities by both Laiki and Bank of Cyprus (BoC), and banks’ activities abroad, such as BoC’s acquisition of Uniastrum and Banca Transilvania.
Greek authorities had originally issued an arrest warrant for Michaelides and his son back in July, but the process was stalled because Cyprus’ constitution prohibited extraditing Cypriots for offences committed before the island joined the EU in May 2004.
Michaelides’s stint as interior minister coincided with Tsohatzopoulos’ time as defence minister in Greece between 1996 and 2001.
Lawmakers here subsequently amended the relevant legislation, removing the exception originally inserted by MPs – in violation of EU rules – reportedly to protect two Cypriot businessmen.
The bill to amend the constitution had been pending from last year.
Greek authorities then moved quickly to rescind the original warrants and issue new ones based on the new state of play.
By Anthony Boadle
The U.S. National Security Agency spied on the communications of the presidents of Brazil and Mexico, a Brazilian news programme reported, a revelation that could strain U.S. relations with the two biggest countries in Latin America.
The report late Sunday by Globo’s news programme “Fantastico” was based on documents that Guardian newspaper journalist Glenn Greenwald obtained from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. Greenwald, who lives in Rio de Janeiro, was listed as a co-contributor to the report.
“Fantastico” showed what it said was an NSA slide dated June 2012 displaying passages of written messages sent by Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto, who was still a candidate at that time. In the messages, Pena Nieto discussed who he was considering naming as his ministers once elected.
A separate slide displayed communication patterns between Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and her top advisers, “Fantastico” said, although no specific written passages were included in the report.
Both slides were part of an NSA case study showing how data could be “intelligently” filtered by the agency’s secret internet surveillance programmes that were disclosed in a trove of documents leaked by Snowden in June, “Fantastico” said.
Brazil’s government, already smarting from earlier reports that the NSA spied on the emails and phone calls of Brazilians, called in U.S. Ambassador Thomas Shannon to explain the new allegations that the agency had spied on Rousseff herself.
Justice Minister Jose Eduardo Cardozo said the contents of the documents, if confirmed, “should be considered very serious and constitute a clear violation of Brazilian sovereignty.”
“This (spying) hits not only Brazil, but the sovereignty of several countries that could have been violated in a way totally contrary to what international law establishes,” he told O Globo newspaper.
STATE VISIT, F-18 JETS
Cardozo travelled last week to Washington and met with U.S. Vice President Joseph Biden and other officials, seeking more details on a previous, seemingly less serious set of disclosures by Snowden regarding U.S. spying in Brazil.
Rousseff is scheduled to make a formal state visit in October to meet with U.S. President Barack Obama in Washington, a trip intended to illustrate the warming in Brazilian-U.S. relations since she took office in 2011.
A spokesman for Rousseff would not comment on the new spying allegations. Mexico’s presidential palace said it had no immediate comment.
Rousseff held a Cabinet meeting on Monday that included the country’s defence, justice, communications and foreign affairs ministers to discuss the espionage report.
In July, after initial reports of NSA surveillance of internet communications in Latin American nations, Mexico’s Pena Nieto said it would be “totally unacceptable” if it were revealed that the United States had spied on its neighbor and largest business partner in the region.
The United States is hoping to sell Brazil 36 F-18 fighter jets, but a Brazilian government official said manufacturer Boeing’s chances of landing the more than $4 billion deal have been set back by the espionage scandal.
During a visit last month, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry urged Brazil not to let spying revelations derail growing trade, diplomatic and cultural relations between the two largest economies in the Americas. But he gave no indication the United States would end the secret surveillance.
Kerry said the NSA surveillance was aimed at protecting Americans and Brazilians from terrorist attacks.
Justice Minister Cardozo said on Monday that the latest revelations based on Snowden’s documents show that U.S. electronic surveillance goes beyond combating terrorism and has political targets and may even involve commercial espionage.
Snowden, an American who worked as a contractor for the NSA before leaking the documents, currently lives in asylum in Russia. “Fantastico” said it contacted Snowden via internet chat, and that Snowden said he could not comment on the content of the report because of his asylum agreement with Russian authorities.
By Peter Stevenson
PRESIDENT of the House of Representatives Yiannakis Omirou and his Israeli counterpart, Knesset Speaker Yuli Yoel Edelstein, signed a protocol of cooperation on Monday in Nicosia.
Speaking after the signing of the protocol, Omirou announced the setting up of a Cyprus-Israeli Friendship Group in the respective parliaments.
Edelstein said that the protocol was “a testament to the joint efforts and close cooperation between our countries”, which he added “will help guide and further strengthen the connection, trust and friendship between Cyprus and Israel in the years to come.”
The Knesset speaker said that Cyprus is “the only EU country that shares a maritime border with Israel and one of our top trade partners”.
“The goal of our agreement is to bolster the ties between Israel and Cyprus, to guide work and collaboration at the highest levels of government,” he said.
Edelstein expressed certainty that Cyprus will succeed in quickly recovering from recent economic troubles and that the Cypriot economy will grow to new heights in the near future.
“It is our hope to see even further economic cooperation and greater trade and investment by Israel in Cyprus to help speed along the recovery process,” Edelstein said.
Omirou said their talks were friendly and productive, covering various issues on which they shared views, such as the necessity for the principles of international law to prevail in the region and to establish conditions of security, stability, cooperation and peace.
He added that they exchanged views on issues such as the exploitation of energy resources in the exclusive economic zones of the two countries.
Referring to the Friendship Group, Omirou said it will hold regular meetings in Cyprus and Israel, to exchange views the shared aims of prosperity, growth and democracy, and promote security, stability, peace and cooperation in the region.
Chairman of the House foreign and European affairs committee and head of DISY Averof Neophytou said that Israel today is Cyprus’ most reliable ally.
“We had a very productive meeting with the Knesset speaker which is the first time Israel’s house president has visited Cyprus,” Neophytou said following his meeting with Edelstein.
Speaking of the protocol signing, Neophytou said it is a sign of the intensification of relations between the two countries’ parliaments.
“We share the same values, respecting human rights, the rights to democracy and we are the exceptions to the rule in the area as we have a functional democracy that respects the human rights of its citizens,” he said.
Neophytou said there is the possibility of further cooperation between the two countries possibly in the field of search and rescue and not only in the field of hydrocarbons.
“Israel, our forgotten neighbour, is today, and we should realise this, our most reliable ally,” he said.
THE moratorium on listing those who have issued bounced cheques came to an end yesterday when the Central Bank (CBC) said the registry was reopening.
The Central Information Registry (CIR), which lists the names of those who have bounced cheques, was stopped in the wake of the capital controls and banking chaos which ensued after the bailout in March.
At the time, the CBC said the list was unfair because circumstances in the wake of the Eurogroup decision made it all too easy for account holders to unwittingly bounce cheques.
But yesterday the CBC announced the CIR will now be reactivated and updated gradually during the current week until September 6.
“This has been deemed necessary to implement the relevant directives for its reactivation, with temporarily modified instructions, which take into account the current economic situation and sensitivities of the business community as a whole,” the CBC said.
According to the CBC, the procedure will take into account the problems arising from capital controls and the measures dealing with the resolution of the banks and stressed the CIR will treat people in a transparent, fair and equitable way.
The new procedures will also simplify the process of settling bounced cheques and getting removed from the CIR.
A person or a company’s name will be placed on the CIR’s blacklist if in the space of three months, three of their cheques bounced, irrespective of the amount, or if a cheque of over €2,000 bounces.
By John Irish
Forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad carried out a “massive and coordinated” chemical attack in Damascus on August 21, according a French intelligence report shown to lawmakers on Monday, a government source said.
The nine-page document – drawn up by France’s military and foreign intelligence services – listed five points that suggested Assad’s fighters were behind the assault, the source told Reuters.
The dossier is central to President Francois Hollande’s calls for Assad to be punished with military action for the reported chemical attack on areas controlled by Syrian rebels during their 2-1/2-year-old uprising.
Britain’s parliament last week voted against taking part in any action against Syria and U.S. President Barack Obama, who also says he thinks Assad’s forces were to blame, has decided to seek Congress approval before any assault.
“This (the attack) poses a major threat to national and global security,” the French source said .
Satellite imagery showed strikes coming from government-controlled areas to the east and west of the Syrian capital and targeting rebel-held zones – areas that have since been bombed to wipe out evidence, the source added.
“Unlike previous attacks that used small amounts of chemicals and were aimed at terrorising people, this attack was tactical and aimed at regaining territory,” the source said.
Around 47 amateur video clips reportedly filmed on the morning of the attack and showing the impact on civilians had been authenticated by French military doctors, according to the intelligence.
Other French evidence gave details of other suspected chemical attacks, in the towns of Saraqib and Jobar in April, which now appeared to have killed about 280 people, the source said.
Other sources have previously told Reuters that the blood and urine samples used for the intelligence were taken after a Syrian government helicopter dropped munitions on April 29 at Saraqib, near the northern city of Idlib.
France had also been testing for sarin in samples of suspected chemical weapons smuggled out by reporters from the French daily Le Monde at Jobar, near central Damascus, in mid-April.
The source said the intelligence had confirmed those attacks took place.
THOUSANDS of people flocked to occupied Morphou on Monday to celebrate the name day of the town’s patron saint Ayios Mamas.
Leading the worshippers were Morphou Metropolitan Neophytos and Mayor Charalambos Pittas who travelled to the town on Sunday evening to take part in late night services.
Present at Monday’s service was US ambassador to Cyprus, John Koenig.
Pittas told the Cyprus News Agency (CNA) that the amount of people making the pilgrimage to Morphou was overwhelming.
“Present at today’s service was the US ambassador which sends a clear message that the church of Ayios Mamas in Morphou is a religious destination for Christian Orthodox worshippers and not a museum,” he said.
THE NEW coalition ‘government’ in the north was sworn in on Monday during a ceremony which saw the newly formed cabinet of the centre-left Republican Turkish Party (CTP) and the Democrat Party (DP) taking their positions.
Former ‘prime minister’ Sibel Siber told reporters that her party had tried to do the best it could for the people and the country but that there are many things that still need to be done. Leader of the CTP, OzkanYorgancioglu praised Siber’s efforts but added that the new coalition would attempt to raise people’s morale even more.
With voter turnout in July’s elections at just 69 per cent – the lowest in two decades – no party claimed outright victory. However, by gaining the largest share of the vote (38.4 per cent), giving the party 21 seats in the 50-seat ‘parliament’, the CTP was charged with forming a ‘government’.
The CTP will be the ruling party and take the ‘ministries’ of interior, foreign affairs, finance, agriculture and energy, labour and health.
Serdar Denktash’s Democrat Party will be the junior coalition partner and take the ‘ministries’ of tourism and economy, public works and transport, education, youth and sport, environment and natural resources.
By Manuel Mogato and Ben Blanchard
The Philippines accused China on Tuesday of violating an informal code of conduct in the South China Sea by planning new structures on a disputed shoal, as China’s premier told Southeast Asian leaders Beijing was serious about peace.
Friction over the South China Sea, one of the world’s most important waterways, has surged as China uses its growing naval might to assert its vast claims over the oil- and gas-rich sea more forcefully, raising fears of a military clash.
Four of the 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), including Vietnam and the Philippines, have overlapping claims with China.
China and the Philippines accuse each other of violating the Declaration of Conduct (DoC), a non-binding confidence-building agreement on maritime conduct signed by China and ASEAN in 2002.
Philippines Defence Secretary Voltaire Gazmin told a congressional budget hearing in Manila that China had violated the DoC by getting ready to build new structures on the disputed Scarborough Shoal.
“We have … sighted concrete blocks inside the shoal which are a prelude to construction,” Gazmin said, displaying air surveillance photos of the rocks.
He said the photos were taken on Saturday, describing them as a worrying pattern of construction that would be similar to the building of a garrison on Mischief Reef in the late 1990s.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said he had “no information” about Gazmin’s accusations.
Regional security scholar Ian Storey said that if Gazmin was correct, it would mark the biggest violation yet of the 2002 declaration.
“If China starts building at Scarborough, then it is an occupation and, I believe, the most egregious violation yet of the 2002 declaration,” said Storey, who is based at Singapore’s Institute of South East Asian Studies.
“It is a very significant development indeed and one that will certainly add to tensions.”
Speaking at a China-ASEAN trade fair in the southern Chinese city of Nanning, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said his country was serious about wanting a peaceful resolution to the South China Sea disputes, though signalled it was in no rush to sign a long-mooted accord to replace the DoC.
After years of resisting efforts by ASEAN to start talks on an agreement on maritime rules governing behaviour in the region, the so-called Code of Conduct, China has said it would host talks between senior officials this month.
Li said China had always advocated talks on the South China Sea on the basis of “respecting historical reality and international law”.
“The Chinese government is willing and ready to assume a policy of seeking an appropriate resolution through friendly consultations,” Li told the audience, which included Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung and Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra.
China would “proceed systematically and soundly push forward talks on the Code of Conduct for the South China Sea”, Li said without elaborating in comments aired live on state television.
He also repeated that talks on the dispute should only be carried out between the parties directly concerned, Beijing’s standard line which rejects the involvement of outside parties such as the United States or multilateral forums.
Washington has not taken sides, but Secretary of State John Kerry reiterated in Brunei in July the U.S. strategic interest in freedom of navigation through the busy sea and its desire to see a Code of Conduct signed quickly.
Critics say China is intent on cementing its claims over the sea through its superior and growing naval might, and has little interest in rushing to agree to the Code of Conduct.
By Mike Collett and Tony Jimenez
ARSENAL paid Real Madrid a club record fee for Germany playmaker Mesut Ozil and Manchester United bought Belgium forward Marouane Fellaini from Everton in a crazy last hour before the transfer window closed on Monday night.
The two big-money deals followed close on the heels of Wales winger Gareth Bale’s world record move from Tottenham Hotspur to Real on Sunday worth 100 million euros.
After a quiet start to deadline day, things began hotting up when Arsenal smashed their club record by spending £42.5 million on Ozil.
The fee eclipsed the previous highest of 15 million pounds that the North London side paid for Russia forward Andriy Arshavin in 2009.
It was also the first major signing of the window for Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger who had been heavily criticised by the fans and the media for not buying new players.
“I have said throughout the summer that we have been working hard to bring in top-quality players,” he told the club website (www.arsenal.com) after landing long-term target Ozil, 24.
“This has involved many, many people across the club and I have always had the full support of the club in making decisions on the football side.”
It was also all quiet on the north-western front at Arsenal’s Premier League rivals Manchester United until manager David Moyes ended his long pursuit of Fellaini by returning to his former club Everton to sign the mop-haired Belgian.
Fellaini, 25, cost the Premier League champions £27.5 million, Everton said on their website (www.evertonfc.com).
Everton were also busy recruiting on deadline day, signing young Chelsea striker Romelu Lukaku and ex-England midfielder Gareth Barry on season-long loan deals and buying playmaker James McCarthy from Wigan Athletic for $20 million.
Everton’s Merseyside rivals Liverpool had completed three deals earlier in the day.
The league leaders signed central defenders Mamadou Sakho and Tiago Ilori from Paris St Germain and Sporting Lisbon and took Nigeria winger Victor Moses on a season-long loan from Chelsea.
Outside the English top flight, Kaka heading back to AC Milan on a free transfer after four forgettable years at Real Madrid topped the list of notable transfers on deadline day.
The Rossoneri moved quickly after selling fellow playmaker Kevin-Prince Boateng to Schalke 04 over the weekend.
Real Madrid loaned Russia forward Denis Cheryshev to La Liga rivals Sevilla for the rest of the season but otherwise the last day of the window was low-key in continental Europe.
Earlier in the window, Neymar’s move from Santos to Barcelona to partner Lionel Messi was a standout deal while Mario Goetze swapping Borussia Dortmund for rivals and European champions Bayern Munich for $48.80 million raised eyebrows.
The other big deals involving German clubs featured Henrikh Mkhitaryan moving from Shakhtar Donetsk to Dortmund for $37 million and Thiago Alcantara leaving Barca for Bayern for $35 million.
Neymar’s move, the highest-profile transfer in Spain apart from Bale, was actually sealed at the end of last season when Barca announced they had secured the services of the Brazil forward for a fee of $75 million.
As well as buying Bale, Real shopped among their La Liga rivals and bought playmaker Isco from Malaga and midfielder Asier Illarramendi from Real Sociedad for $39.5 million each.
They also sold three players to Napoli, including Argentina striker Gonzalo Higuain, where they joined up with Spanish coach Rafa Benitez.
Aside from Real and Barca, the world’s richest clubs by income, La Liga’s cash-strapped teams generally had to sell off their top talent, continuing the trend of recent years.
Sevilla cashed in on Alvaro Negredo and Jesus Navas, selling the Spain pair to Manchester City for $33 million and $26 million respectively.
City also invested in Fernandinho from Shakhtar for $55 million while Valencia offloaded Spain striker Roberto Soldado to Tottenham for $40 million.
In France, champions Paris St Germain went into action late as they first had to find a replacement for coach Carlo Ancelotti who left for Real Madrid.
Having appointed Laurent Blanc, their first signing was Edinson Cavani from Napoli for $84 million, a fee second only to the Bale deal in this window.
PSG, who have signed two dozen players since the Qatari fund QSI bought them in 2011, then limited their moves to a couple of exciting youngsters in defenders Marquinhos and Lucas Digne for $42 million and $20 million.
They beat Monaco to Digne but the wealthy principality club had already struck deals with Colombia striker Radamel Falcao, compatriot James Rodriguez and Portuguese Joao Moutinho for a total of $171 million.
The embattled chairman of public telecoms company CyTA will be stepping down this month, the government said on Tuesday.
Stathis Kittis met President Nicos Anastasiades on Tuesday and informed him of his intention to submit his resignation this month, after finishing the organisation’s annual report, the government spokesman said.
Kittis is currently embroiled in the investigation of a suspicious land deal, involving CyTA’s pension fund, which has so far seen the arrest of two police officers and a businessman.
His resignation had been sought by the government.
“During the meeting, the president made it clear to Mr. Kittis that the ongoing investigation will follow the legal process,” Christos Stylianides said.
The land deal in question involved the purchase by CyTA’s pension fund of office space near Larnaca airport at reportedly a price several times the going market value.
Allegations have surfaced that millions were paid in kickbacks to make the deal possible.
Police last week arrested a businessman and two police officers in connection with the case.
Businessman Nicos Lillis, who is also the chairman of Alki football club, is a shareholder in Wadnic Trading Ltd, the company which purchased the land in 2007.
The officers, members of the secret service KYP, are suspected of drafting a false report that enabled the sale of the land, which belonged to a Turkish Cypriot.
The two officers allegedly produced a report saying the Turkish Cypriot seller had resided in the government-controlled areas for six months – a necessary condition — for selling the land.
The land in Dromolaxia, Larnaca, was sold to a Greek Cypriot businessman who changed its terms of use, upgraded the coefficients, built on it and sold it on to the CyTA pension fund, at several times the price he bought it from the original owner.
By Steve Gutterman
Russia raised the alarm on Tuesday after detecting the launch of two ballistic “objects” in the Mediterranean Sea but Israel later said it had carried out a joint missile test with the United States.
There were no reports of missile strikes on Syria. Syrian state sources said the missiles had fallen harmlessly into the sea and there were no explosions in the capital Damascus, Russian news agencies reported.
Initial reports of the launch by Russian news agencies had ruffled financial markets because the United States is preparing for a possible military strike on Syria over what it says was a chemical weapons attack by government forces in their conflict with rebels trying to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.
But the Israeli Defence Ministry said it had tested a missile used as a target in a U.S.-funded anti-missile system at 9:15 a.m (0615 GMT), about the same time as the Russian radar picked up the launch.
“The trajectory of these objects goes from the central part of the Mediterranean Sea toward the eastern part of the Mediterranean coast,” Russia’s Interfax news agency quoted a Defence Ministry spokesman as saying.
The spokesman said the launch was picked up by an early warning radar station at Armavir, near the Black Sea, which is designed to detect missiles from Europe and Iran.
He did not say who had carried out the launch and whether any impact had been detected, but RIA news agency later quoted a source in Syria’s “state structures” as saying the objects had fallen harmlessly into the sea.
The Russian Defence Ministry declined comment to Reuters.
The Russian Embassy in Syria said there were no signs of a missile attack or explosions in Damascus, state-run Itar-Tass reported.
Syria’s early warning radar system did not detect any missiles landing on Syrian territory, according to a Syrian security source quoted by Lebanon’s al-Manar television.
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu informed President Vladimir Putin of the launch but it was not immediately clear how he reacted.
Brent crude oil extended gains to rise by more than $1 per barrel and Dubai’s share index fell after Russia said it detected the launches.
Russia opposes any outside military intervention in the Syrian civil war, and a Defence Ministry official had earlier criticised the United States for deploying warships in the Mediterranean close to Syria.
Assad’s government denies responsibility for the deaths of hundreds of people in the alleged poison gas attack on Aug. 21.
Russia, Assad’s most powerful backer during the more than two-year-old conflict in Syria, says it suspects the attack was staged by rebels to provoke military intervention and is critical of U.S. naval deployments in the Mediterranean.
Five U.S. destroyers and an amphibious ship are in the Mediterranean, poised for possible strikes against Syria with cruise missiles – which are not ballistic. U.S. officials said the aircraft carrier USS Nimitz and four other ships in its strike group moved into the Red Sea on Monday.
“The pressure being applied by the United States causes particular concern,” Itar-Tass quoted Russian Defence Ministry official Oleg Dogayev as saying.
He said “the dispatch of ships armed with cruise missiles toward Syria’s shores has a negative effect on the situation in the region.”
Maximum demand for electricity during the summer dropped 18.5 per cent year-on-year, the transmission system operator (TSO) said on Tuesday, as the recession plaguing the island worsened.
According to the TSO, peak demand during the summer period dropped to 815 megawatts compared with 996MW last year.
The months that see the most demand for electricity are July and August.
TSO head Christos Christodoulides said 2011 could not be taken into account due to the munitions explosion on July 11 that year that incapacitated the island’s largest power plant, causing rolling power cuts for around a month.
Maximum demand in 2010 was 1,143MW, Christodoulides said, 29 per cent higher than this year.
By Tom Miles and Yara Bayoumy
The number of Syrian refugees has passed the two million mark, a United Nations agency said on Tuesday, warning that the world faces its greatest threat to peace since the Vietnam war.
As President Barack Obama wrestled with doubters in Congress ahead of votes next week on possible U.S. strikes on Syria, Israeli forces training with the U.S. navy in the Mediterranean set nerves on edge in Damascus with a missile test that triggered an alert from the Syrian government’s ally Russia.
Obama has asked lawmakers to back military action to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for killing hundreds of people with poison gas last month – a charge Assad denied on Monday as he warned Washington and its French allies of retribution.
With many Americans, including legislators from his own Democratic party, fearful of embroiling the United States in a third major war in a Muslim country this century, Obama has insisted he is not seeking “regime change” in Syria.
But that is precisely what Syrian rebels and their backers among Washington’s Arab allies want as they struggle to hold their ground, let alone advance. According to one opposition report, government forces took the strategic northwestern town of Ariha on Tuesday, though others said the battle was not over.
Assad’s enemies point to the toll that two and a half years of war have taken on Syria’s people, of whom 100,000 have been killed and nearly one in three driven from their homes in fear.
The U.N. refugee agency UNHCR said in a statement on Tuesday that a near tenfold increase over the past 12 months in the rate of refugees crossing Syria’s borders into Turkey, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon – to a daily average of nearly 5,000 men, women and children – had pushed the total living abroad above two million.
That represents some 10 percent of Syria’s population, the UNHCR said. With a further 4.25 million estimated to have been displaced but still resident inside the country, that leaves close to a third of all Syrians living away from home.
Comparing the figures to the peak of Afghanistan’s refugee crisis two decades ago, U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Antonio Guterres, said: “Syria has become the great tragedy of this century – a disgraceful humanitarian calamity with suffering and displacement unparalleled in recent history.”
Speaking of the acceleration in the crisis, he said: “What is appalling is that the first million fled Syria in two years. The second million fled Syria in six months.”
At a news conference in Geneva, Guterres noted that a total of six million were displaced by the war: “At this particular moment, it’s the highest number of displaced people anywhere in the world. And if one looks at the peak of the Afghan crisis we have probably very similar numbers of people displaced.
“The risks for global peace and security that the present Syria crisis represents, I’m sure, are not smaller than what we have witnessed in any other crisis that we have had since the Vietnam war,” said Guterres, a former Portuguese prime minister.
MISSILE FIRED
When Russia raised the alarm on Tuesday morning that its forces had detected the launch of two ballistic “objects” in the Mediterranean, thoughts of a surprise strike on Syria pushed oil prices higher on world markets and must have put the troops operating Syria’s Russian-equipped air defence system on alert.
A Syrian security official later told a Lebanese television channel that its early warning radar had picked up no threats.
Clarification came only later when the Israeli Defence Ministry said that its troops had – at the time of the Russian alert – fired a missile that is used as a target for an anti-missile defence system during an exercise with U.S. forces.
The jitters reflected a nervousness both within Syria and further afield since Western leaders pledged retribution for the use of chemical weapons.
Obama’s surprise decision on Saturday to refer to Congress for approval next week has, however, delayed any U.S. move.
Britain has dropped out of planning for attacks since its parliament rejected a proposal by Prime Minister David Cameron but France, western Europe’s other main military power, is still coordinating possible action with the Pentagon.
President Francois Hollande has resisted opposition calls to submit any decision to wage war to parliament. His government presented lawmakers on Monday with what it said was evidence of Assad’s responsibility for a “massive and coordinated” chemical attack on rebel-held suburbs of Damascus on Aug. 21.
Assad warned: “Everybody will lose control of the situation when the powder keg blows. There is a risk of a regional war.”
OBAMA CAMPAIGN
Obama’s efforts to persuade the U.S. Congress to back his plan to attack Syria met with scepticism on Monday from lawmakers in his own Democratic Party who expressed concern the United States would be dragged into a new Middle East conflict.
“There is a lot of scepticism,” said Representative Jim Moran after taking part in a 70-minute phone briefing for Democratic lawmakers by Obama’s top national security aides about the response to a chemical weapons attack that U.S. officials say killed 1,429 people two weeks ago.
Obama appeared to make some headway, however, with two influential Republican senators, John McCain and Lindsey Graham, who came out of a White House meeting convinced that Obama is willing to use air strikes not just to destroy Syrian chemical weapons capability but also to bolster Syrian rebels.
McCain, long an advocate of a more robust U.S. approach to Syria, said failure to get behind strikes against Assad’s forces would be “catastrophic.”
Obama’s abrupt decision to halt plans for a strike against Assad’s forces and instead wait for congressional approval has generated a raging debate just as the president prepares to depart on Tuesday on a trip centred on a G20 summit in Russia.
The biggest obstacle he faces is winning the support of members of his own party in the House of Representatives and conservative Republicans who see little need for the United States to get involved in distant civil wars.
Secretary of State John Kerry, who was among the Obama advisers on the call for the Democrats, urged support for giving Obama a resolution to use force, saying Syria had reached a “Munich moment”, according to participants. At Munich in 1938, Britain and France cut a deal with Nazi Germany to avert war.
With U.S. warships in place and ready to launch cruise missiles on Obama’s order, no decision is likely until days after Congress returns from its summer recess on Monday.
Obama’s gamble to seek congressional backing carries many risks, chief among them is that Congress will again thwart him and make him and the United States look weak around the world.
Greek investment group Marfin (MIG) is to turn to international arbitrators in an attempt to recover €824 million from Cyprus over the winding down of Laiki Bank.
MIG lost its stake in the bank after it was shut down under the terms of a €10 billion bailout deal for Cyprus, which was agreed with international lenders in March.
The Greek group’s investment in Laiki had already been diluted when the bank was nationalised in mid-2012 after its capital base was hit by a write-down in Greek government debt, to which it was heavily exposed.
Athens-based MIG said on Tuesday that it would submit a request for arbitration against the Republic of Cyprus at an international tribunal operating under the auspices of the World Bank.
MIG put the value of its investment in Laiki at €824 million and said that another 20 legal entities and individuals would join the action, seeking an additional €229 million.
The action is being launched after the lapsing of a six-month window to seek an amicable settlement with Cyprus, MIG said.
Laiki has ceased operations and some of its assets have been assumed by Bank of Cyprus. (Reuters)
The Shacolas Group announced Tuesday it would continue to offer breakfasts to needy students until the end of year.
“Despite the financial crisis affecting all aspects of economic life and the Cypriot community, as well as businesses, the ‘Nicos & Elpida Shacola Foundation’ and the Shacolas Group will continue for the new school year to care for and prepare up to 5,000 breakfasts for needy children of primary schools and some gymanasia, like last year,” a statement said.
The breakfasts, the statement continued, are produced with fresh ingredients, packaged adequately and will be delivered daily to Education Ministry representatives in Nicosia, Limassol, Larnaca and Paphos to get to schools every morning.
“The Shacolas Group would like to express its satisfaction because through cooperation with the Education Ministry our offer reaches needy children in a timely manner,” the statement added.
Breakfasts will be given to needy children until the end of the year, as it was originally announced by the group and foundation’s founder, wealthy businessman Nicos Shacolas earlier this year.
By George Psyllides
THE House Finance Committee will explore the possibility of last-minute changes to a road tax bill that has drawn reaction from various interest groups.
Car rental companies, car importers and tourist bus owners have all expressed concerns about the bill, each for their own reasons.
Car importers want the tax brackets changed to make them fairer, they said. They also want their stock to be exempted from the new road tax and new registration fees.
Their request included shipments that have already been ordered and are on their way to Cyprus.
Car rental companies said the increased costs would be transferred to consumers – a rise that could reach up to200 per cent on the daily fee.
The owners of tourist coaches claimed that the new provisions could cost a bus company €100,000 annually. A single owner would have to pay €30,000, they said.
Committee chairman, DIKO MP Nicolas Papadopoulos, conceded that the bill could not satisfy everyone but added that a last-minute effort will be made to improve the provisions.
Papadopolos stressed that approval of the bill, along with a string of others, was a precondition for the release of the second tranche of Cyprus’ bailout.
The new road tax charge for vehicles registered from the start of next year will depend on their CO2 emissions.
Vehicles registered by the end of the year will not have to pay road tax based on their CO2 emissions, as part of new legislation, but their owners will be charged an additional fee depending on engine size.
Specifically, electric cars will be exempted from the registration fee.
The same goes for vehicles with CO2 emissions of less than or equal to 120g/km (combined cycle).
The registration fee for vehicles with CO2 emissions over 120g/km and up to 150g/km will be €25 per gramme over 120.
A €750 fee will be charged for vehicles emitting between 150g/km and 180g/km and a €2,250 fee for emissions above that, plus €400 for every gramme over 180.
The new road tax will be charged as follows: vehicles emitting 120g/km, €0.5 per gramme, 120g/km – 150g/km, €3, 150g/km – 180g/km, €3, and over 180g/km, €8.
For already registered vehicles (cars and motorcycles) , the bill provides for a special fee – above and beyond the current road tax – of €10 for low emissions, €20 for vehicles with engine displacements up to 2,050 cubic centimeters, and €30 for vehicles with engine displacements than 2,050 cc.
By Stefanos Evripidou
GREECE IS ready to help Cyprus provide temporary shelter to foreign nationals fleeing from the neighbouring region in the event the Syrian crisis deteriorates, Communications Minister Tasos Mitsopoulos said Tuesday.
The minister met with high-ranking Greek officials to discuss Cyprus’ contingency plan, dubbed ‘Estia’, prepared in the event the situation on the ground in Syria and possibly Lebanon deteriorates.
Under the plan, Cyprus will utilise its experience from the Israel-Lebanon war in 2006 to transform large buildings into shelters for incoming foreign nationals from friendly countries to Cyprus.
According to Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides, Cyprus can take in 10,000 foreign nationals a day so long as an equal number leave the island for another destination within 48 hours. The governments of the foreign nationals will be responsible for ensuring their prompt departure from Cyprus.
Mitsopoulos met the head of civil protection under the Greek Ministry of Public Order, Patroclos Georgiades and the general secretary for Population and Social Cohesion, under the Greek Interior Ministry, Angelos Syrigos.
Speaking after the meeting, the minister said he exchanged views with both officials on coordinating actions to address the humanitarian crisis in Syria.
The two Greek officials held a series of contacts in Nicosia yesterday, aiming “to better coordinate efforts by the two countries to deal with problems that may possibly arise from the deterioration of the crisis in Syria”, Mitsopoulos said.
The aim, he went on, is to manage an eventual mass evacuation of refugees, either from Syria or Lebanon.
“We are fully prepared to deal with every incident,” Mitsopoulos said, adding that Greece has also expressed readiness to aid the Cyprus Republic in evacuating foreign nationals en masse.
For his part, Georgiades said Greece has its own contingency plan in place, called ‘Ioni’, noting that the aim of the visit is for Athens and Nicosia to “coordinate efforts, in order to deal with refugee flows though common actions”, while activating in parallel European mechanisms for providing assistance.
“The problem will not solely concern Cyprus or Greece, but Europe and our partners as well,” said Georgiades.
Syrigos said Greece will assist Cyprus in accelerating the operation to shelter foreign nationals briefly in Cyprus and then transfer them on to other countries.
The Greek officials also met yesterday with Interior Minister Socrates Hasikos and attended a meeting at the Foreign Ministry’s Crisis Management Centre.
By Steve Holland and Matt Spetalnick
President Barack Obama issued a blunt challenge to skeptical U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday to approve his plan for a military strike on Syria, saying otherwise they would put America’s international prestige and their own credibility at risk.
Using a visit to Sweden to build his case for limited military action against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Obama insisted that the international community could not remain silent in the face of the “barbarism” of the Aug. 21 chemical weapons attack he blamed on Syrian government forces.
“My credibility is not on the line. The international community’s credibility is on the line,” Obama told a news conference in Stockholm. “And America and Congress’ credibility is on the line, because we give lip service to the notion that these international norms are important.”
Just a day before he travels to St. Petersburg to attend a G20 summit hosted by Vladimir Putin, Obama said he held out hope that the Russian president would back away from his support for Assad. But he stopped short of saying he had any high expectations for a change of heart.
Obama’s comments came after Putin offered a glimpse of potential international compromise over Syria on Wednesday by declining to entirely rule out Russian backing for military action as he prepared to host a summit of world leaders. At the same time, Putin said any strike on Syria would be illegal without U.N. support.
Obama has taken a big political gamble by delaying military action in Syria and instead trying to convince a divided U.S. Congress to grant authorization for a strike on government targets in Syria.
Aides say that even as Obama travels he will stay on top of the congressional debate raging back in Washington, where his national security team has waged an intensive campaign to ease the concerns of reluctant lawmakers and a war-weary American public.
While declaring that he believes Congress will give him approval, Obama ratcheted up the pressure for swift legislative action, saying inaction could embolden Assad to carry out further attacks.
“The question is how credible is Congress when it passes a treaty saying we have to forbid the use of chemical weapons,” Obama said.
WILL OBAMA ACT ALONE?
Obama declined to say whether he would proceed with a military strike even if Congress rejected the plan. But he said he was not required by law to put the matter before Congress and made clear he reserves the right to act to protect U.S. national security.
Obama will fly to St. Petersburg on Thursday to take part in an annual two-day summit of the Group of 20 leading economies, a gathering sure to be dominated by tensions over Syria.
The meetings will bring him face-to-face with Putin, a key Syrian ally, the main arms supplier to Damascus and a staunch critic of the U.S. push for military action.
“Do I hold out hope that Mr. Putin may change his position on some of these issues? I’m always hopeful, and I will continue to engage him,” Obama told reporters.
Syria tops the list of disputes that have sent U.S.-Russian ties to one of their lowest points since the end of the Cold War.
Obama’s three-day foreign trip offers a chance to lobby world leaders for their support and possibly shore up a shaky international coalition against Syria.
Britain, a generally reliable U.S. ally, pulled out after a parliamentary revolt last week, but France, western Europe’s other main military power, is still coordinating possible action with the Pentagon.
Any attack on Syria is likely on hold until at least next week, the earliest timeframe for a vote by lawmakers, who formally reconvene on Sept. 9 after their summer break.
Obama faces a tough fight in Congress for endorsement of military action over what Washington says was the killing of 1,400 people in a chemical weapons attack carried out by Assad’s forces.
Many lawmakers staunchly oppose a strike, fearing it would entangle the United States in the seemingly intractable Syrian civil war. Others favor rewriting the use-of-force resolution the White House sent to Capitol Hill over the weekend so that it sets clear limits on any military action.
Still others, mostly more hawkish Republicans, want Obama to make sure any strike is punishing enough to weaken the Syrian military, and are calling for increased help for beleaguered anti-Assad rebels.
By George Psyllides
CO-OPERATIVE banks and the government have agreed on a formula for the sector to buy back its shares, which will go to the state after the sector is recapitalised using public funds.
According to the scheme, co-ops will pay the state 10 per cent annually as interest on the capital held by the government, and use the rest of its profits to buy back the shares.
The state will fund co-operatives with €1.5 billion, effectively making it its sole owner with a 99 per cent share.
The cash is part of the island’s €10 billion international bailout.
Observers had suggested that the co-operative movement would never be able to buy back its shares, prompting the state to sell them to the private sector in a bid to recoup its investment.
Co-operative officials however, expressed optimism that the sector will be able to recover its shares.
“According to our estimates, there are satisfactory profits that will allow us to at least buy back the majority of shares within a reasonable period of time,” said Co-operative Central Bank trusteeship committee chairman Giorgos Iosif said, seeking to dispel concerns that the sector will fall into private hands.
Parliament heard recently that co-ops needed around €1.4bn to recapitalise, while the remaining €100m will be used as a buffer in case the banks’ capital needs end up being more extreme than the extreme scenarios estimated by investment firm Pimco, which carried out an audit of their portfolios.
Iosif said Pimco’s estimates were excessive and he played down the extent of the sector’s non-performing loans (NPLs).
“We are not concerned about the level of NPLs,” he said.
Iosid said NPL was a technical term that included loans serviced with lower instalments.
“We are optimistic … that a large part, much bigger (of NPLs) than what Pimco estimates, will be collected by co-ops,” Iosif said.
As part of the bailout, co-operatives will go through a process of consolidation that will see the number of credit institutions cut from 93 to 18.
Around 25 per cent of the sector’s 410 branches will close.
A “generous” early retirement scheme will also be offered to the 3,000 workers but no figures concerning staff reductions were given yet.
An Independent Commission on the Future of the Banking Sector said in June that the co-operatives’ days had passed as Cyprus is no longer the agrarian economy they were set up to serve 100 years ago.
“Specifically, we recommend that the co-ops be combined into a single institution with a joint stock structure and a commercial culture, and that this institution be placed under the direct supervision of the Central Bank of Cyprus,” the commission said.
It will be the third time co-ops are bailed out by taxpayers after receiving 22 million Cyprus pounds in the late 70s and a further 67 million Cyprus pounds in the late 80s.
