By George Psyllides

The trial of former Central Bank governor Christodoulos Christodoulou has been adjourned for three months to give time to the sides to look into the possibility of agreeing on certain facts relating to the case.

Christodoulou was charged in May in connection with a €1 million cash transfer from a Greek ship-owner to a company managed by his daughter.

Along with Christodoulou, prosecutors also charged his daughter Athena, and his former son-in-law Andreas Kizourides.

The three pleaded not guilty to the 11 charges, which include conspiracy to commit felony and forgery.

The court adjourned for September 26 allowing the two sides to look into whether they could agree on certain facts and possibly save some time.

The charges are linked with a document submitted to a Marfin-Laiki Bank branch in Athens, which stated that Kizourides had sold the daughter’s company two plots of land in Strovolos for €1.1 million.

The letter was allegedly written to enable the transfer of the €1 million, which had been deposited in the company’s account in Greece, to an account belonging to Kizourides in Cyprus.

The former CBC boss has previously claimed that the money was a down payment for consultancy services that would have been provided over ten years to Focus, a company belonging to Michalis Zolotas.

Christodoulous also submitted a copy of an agreement between his daughter’s company and Focus.

Zolotas is said to be an associate of former Laiki strongman Andreas Vgenopoulos whom many hold responsible for the collapse of the island’s banking system.

The transfer in question was allegedly made to the company’s Athens-based bank account in July 2007.

Around two years later, the €1 million plus interest was then allegedly transferred to an account in Laiki Bank.

Christodoulou had served as Governor of the Central Bank of Cyprus from 2002 to 2007, and the suspicious transfer was reportedly made a few months after his term expired

Vgenopoulos has said that Zolotas was not his associate.

In a statement issued in May, Vgenopoulos said Zolotas was not his friend and nor an associate, as Cypriot media had reported, and that the ship-owner had ties with Laiki long before he came onto the scene.

Vgenopoulos said he had asked Zolotas to issue a statement to clarify his relation with him and explain his acts to the Cypriot people, but the Greek ship-owner had refused.

The Committee on Foreign Affairs of the US House has passed the Turkey Christian Churches Accountability Act (HR 4347), introduced by Chairman Ed Royce, which requires an annual report from the State Department on the status of stolen, confiscated or unreturned Christian properties in Turkey and in the north of Cyprus.

On the passage of the Act, Chairman Royce said: “I have long been concerned that Christian heritage sites in Turkey have been deteriorating and disappearing in the face of hostile government policies.  Despite optimistic claims by Turkish leaders, a majority of religious properties remain unreturned”.

There is even, he added, legislation before the Turkish Parliament “to convert the landmark Hagia Sophia in Istanbul from a museum to a mosque”.

“The US must hold Turkish leaders to their promises.  By passing this legislation, the US sends a message to Turkey that it must return church properties to their rightful owners, while providing an objective measure of their progress each year,” he concluded.

The draft law which was presented by Royce and the minority leader Eliot Engel strengthens previous legislation (HR 306) that was adopted unanimously by Congress in December 2011 and called on Turkey to respect its international obligations and to return confiscated fortunes of Christian churches and to fully respect the rights of Christians to practice their religion.

The legislation specifically calls the US Secretary to record all Christian churches, places of worship and other church properties, including movable assets, such as works of art and objects from Turkey and areas of the Republic of Cyprus under military occupation by Turkey and that have been claimed as stolen, confiscated or illegally removed from the owners of Christian churches.

It also requires a summary of that information to be included in the annual reports of human rights and religious freedoms of the State Department.

The legislation refers to the north of Cyprus. The legislation was promoted  by Greek American and Armenian American organisations.

After the Turkish invasion churches in the north were vandalized and looted, and icons, frescoes and mosaics were removed. Much of the stolen items have been traced in Europe’s illegal antiquities trade markets and in auctions around the world. (CNA)

By Robin Emmott and Justyna Pawlak

The European Union signed an historic free-trade pact with Ukraine on Friday and warned it could impose more sanctions on Moscow unless pro-Russian rebels act to wind down the crisis in the east of the country by Monday.

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko came to Brussels to sign a far-reaching trade and political cooperation agreement with the EU that has been at the heart of months of deadly violence and upheaval in his country, drawing an immediate threat of “grave consequences” from Russia.

Georgia and Moldova signed similar deals, holding out the prospect of deep economic integration and unfettered access to the EU’s 500 million citizens, but alarming Moscow which is concerned about losing influence over former Soviet republics.

EU leaders meeting in Brussels demanded that, by Monday, Ukrainian rebels agree to ceasefire verification arrangements, return border checkpoints to Kiev authorities, free hostages and launch serious talks on implementing Poroshenko’s peace plan.

EU governments “will assess the situation and, should it be required, adopt necessary decisions,” the EU leaders said in a statement, adding they were ready to meet again at any time to adopt significant sanctions on Russia.

If Ukrainian rebels do not de-escalate tensions, the EU may expand sanctions against Russia as early as next week, by targeting new people and companies with asset freezes, diplomats told Reuters. More than 60 names are already on the list.

Although it has drawn up a list of hard-hitting economic sanctions against Russia, the EU still does not appear ready to deploy them because of fears among some member states of antagonizing their major energy supplier.

“We are talking about possible sanctions against Russia but we do not have to introduce sanctions for the sake of sanctions. We do have a need for a dialogue. I hope this dialogue will take place and we will have a real ceasefire,” Poroshenko told a news conference in Brussels.

Poroshenko has drawn up a 15-point peace plan to defuse the crisis in eastern Ukraine, where hundreds of people have been killed in clashes between security forces and pro-Russian rebels. A week-long ceasefire is due to expire later on Friday.

Poroshenko said on Friday he would take a decision on extending a ceasefire in the east of the country when he returns to Kiev following an EU summit in Brussels.

But, according to two EU diplomats, Poroshenko told the leaders of France and Germany he was proposing to extend the ceasefire by 72 hours, coinciding with the EU’s deadline.

Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova have made clear their ultimate goal is EU entry but Brussels, under pressure from voters weary of further expansion, has made no promise it will allow them in.

PACT REVIVED

Ukraine’s former pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovich turned his back on signing the EU agreement last November in favour of closer ties with Moscow, prompting months of street protests that eventually led to his fleeing the country.

Soon afterwards, Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimea region, drawing outrage and sanctions from the United States and EU, and pro-Russian separatists began an uprising in eastern Ukraine.

“Over the last months, Ukraine paid the highest possible price to make her European dreams come true,” Poroshenko said, calling Friday’s accord the most important day for his country since independence from the crumbling Soviet Union in 1991.

Symbolically, he signed the agreement with the same pen that had been prepared for Yanukovich to sign the document last year.

Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin immediately said the signing would have “grave consequences” for Ukraine, Interfax news agency reported.

Poroshenko urged the EU to reward Ukraine for its sacrifices by promising the country would be eligible for membership of the EU once it was ready. The pledge would “cost the EU nothing but would mean the world to my country”, he said.

European Council President Herman Van Rompuy said Friday’s deals were “not the final stage of our cooperation”, but this fell short of the prospect of ultimate EU membership.

Moldovan Prime Minister Iurie Leanca has also set his sights on EU membership, saying on Thursday that he hoped his country would apply to join in the second half of 2015.

Russia, which fought a war with Georgia in 2008, has met previous attempts by its neighbours to move closer to the EU with trade reprisals. EU officials fear it could happen again.

EU officials say that, in diplomatic talks, Russia has threatened to withdraw the duty-free treatment that Ukraine currently benefits from as a member of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) free trade pact.

One senior EU official called the Russian threat “deeply shocking” while another said such a move would violate the CIS agreement and World Trade Organisation rules.

If Russia imposed customs duties, it would put at risk some of Ukraine’s exports, which mainly consist of base metals, grains, machinery, equipment and processed food. Ukraine sends 24 per cent of its exports to Russia, worth $15 billion a year.

Moscow fears Ukraine may re-export EU products to Russia, avoiding duties that Russia imposes to protect its own output.

Russian energy giant Gazprom cut off gas supplies to Kiev last week after Ukraine failed to pay its gas debts.

The EU exported 23.9 billion euros of goods to Ukraine in 2013 and imported 13.8 billion worth, EU data shows.

As part of the deal, the EU will insist that Ukraine meet its standards on human rights and democracy, fights corruption, strengthens the rule of law and reforms its economy.

By Steve Holland

The United States said on Friday it would no longer produce or purchase landmines that target people, paving the way for Washington to eventually join an international treaty banning the weapons.

The Obama administration stopped short, however, of announcing that it would destroy its large existing stockpile of anti-personnel landmines.

The decision was announced at a review conference of the Mine Ban Treaty in Mozambique, where advocates welcomed the administration’s statement but said it did not go far enough because Washington reserved the right to continue using its current stockpile.

“We are diligently pursuing solutions that would be compliant with and ultimately allow the United States to accede to the Ottawa Convention – the treaty banning the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of APL (anti-personnel landmines),” the White House said in a statement.

The US delegation attending the review conference declared the administration would “not produce or otherwise acquire any anti-personnel landmines in the future, including to replace existing stockpiles as they expire,” the statement said.

The United States has not produced landmines since 1997 but had reserved the right to resume production until Friday’s announcement. It is not known to have used anti-personnel landmines in combat since the 1991 Gulf War.

Landmines kill 15,000 to 20,000 people each year, mainly children, women and the elderly, according to a 2008 United Nations report. The Mine Ban Treaty became international law in 1999.

‘SMART LANDMINES’

Washington abides by many provisions of the treaty, which had been endorsed by 161 countries as of January but has not been joined by Russia, China, India and the United States.

The United States stopped using long-life anti-personnel mines in 2011 and agreed to destroy its stockpile of 1.3 million of the weapons. But it maintains a supply of so-called smart landmines that can deactivate or self-destruct.

Army General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told a congressional panel in March that mines were “an important tool in the arsenal of the armed forces.”

Some Republican lawmakers questioned the wisdom of Obama’s announcement. “(Obama’s) announcement today is perfect for a feel good press release but bad for the security of our men and women in uniform,” California Representative Buck McKeon, chairman of the House of Representatives Armed Services committee, said in a statement.

But Vermont Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy, who has pushed for a ban, called the White House’s action “incremental, but significant.”

“An obvious next step is for the Pentagon to destroy its remaining stockpile of mines, which do not belong in the arsenal of civilized nations,” he said in a statement.

Steve Goose of Human Rights Watch welcomed the US announcement, but said it “does not go nearly far enough.”

“The US is reserving the right to use its 10 million anti personnel mines until they expire and are no longer usable. It makes little sense to acknowledge that the weapons must be banned due to the humanitarian harm they cause, and yet to insist on being able to use them,” he said in an email.

He urged Washington to set a target date for joining the treaty.

By Karolos Grohmann

A 90-day provisional ban by FIFA on World Cup-winning player and coach Franz Beckenbauer has been lifted after only 15 days with world soccer’s governing body saying on Friday the German was now welcome at the tournament.

German football association (DFB) president Wolfgang Niersbach welcomed the move and said he could not understand why FIFA had taken such a drastic step in the first place against someone who had done so much for international soccer.

Beckenbauer, one of the world’s best known former players, had been banned two weeks ago after refusing to cooperate with an investigation into the award of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar.

The 68-year-old is a former member of the FIFA executive committee which controversially awarded the World Cup to Qatar in 2010, and had received “repeated requests” to provide information, FIFA said in a statement at the time of the ban.

Beckenbauer has since had a change of heart and offered to provide responses to the questions which he had initially rejected because they were written in “legalese English.”

FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke told reporters that Beckenbauer could now attend the tournament he graced as a player with West Germany.

Beckenbauer has however indicated he has no plans to come to Brazil for the tournament.

“As you know Franz is someone we all respect and was an amazing footballer and we would love him to have him here at the World Cup, even more because his national team is playing in the second round,” Valcke told reporters in Rio de Janeiro.

“But it is his decision not to come to Brazil and that’s his decision,” he added.

Beckenbauer’s manager Markus Hoefl had earlier announced the end of the ban, saying it had been unjust but conceding that it would have been better had the former player answered the questions posed to him by the commission earlier.

“I underestimated the situation mainly because such issues were usually dealt with by my management,” Beckenbauer said.

The ban issued at the start of the World Cup in Brazil meant he could not attend any games in an official capacity, embarrassing such a high profile figure in the game.

FIFA told Beckenbauer that a repeat of his actions could lead to further sanctions.

DFB president Niersbach said FIFA’s ban was an over-reaction.

“It was completely incomprehensible to me why such a ban was issued on the second day of a World Cup,” Niersbach said in a statement to Reuters.

“Perhaps Franz made a formal mistake but still that’s not the proper way to treat someone who has done so much for soccer all around the world.”

As a player, Beckenbauer redefined the role of libero or sweeper and captained the West Germany side which won the 1974 World Cup.

He led West Germany to World Cup victory as a coach in 1990 and was head of the local organising committee when Germany hosted the showpiece in 2006.

By Malena Castaldi

LUIS Suarez flew home to Uruguay on Friday after being thrown out of the World Cup and banned from soccer for four months for biting Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini, who criticized the punishment as “excessive”.

Liverpool striker Suarez was met by outraged President Jose Mujica when he landed at a military base next to Uruguay’s main airport before dawn, an air force spokesman said.

After his arrival, Suarez, his wife and other family members were driven to a home he has in the small coastal town of Solymar.

The 27-year-old striker has not spoken publicly since soccer’s world governing body FIFA ruled on Thursday that he cannot play in Uruguay’s next nine competitive matches and suspended him from the game for four months.

FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke defended the decision, saying that Suarez’s previous misdemeanours on the pitch had been taken into account. The player has been banned twice before for biting during club games.

“If it’s the first time, it’s an incident. More than once, it is not any more an incident,” Valcke told reporters. “That is why also the sanction, it has to be exemplary.”

He also said Suarez should seek treatment to help him avoid such incidents in the future.

The ban has sparked fury in Suarez’s homeland and his victim Chiellini came out yesterday and said he felt no anger towards the Uruguayan.

“Now inside me there’s no feelings of joy, revenge or anger against Suarez for an incident that happened on the pitch and that’s done,” the Juventus centre back said in a statement on his website.

“… I believe that the proposed formula is excessive,” Chiellini added.

FIFPro, the international soccer players’ union, also questioned the severity of the punishment, which will mean Suarez misses the start of the season for his English club Liverpool.

“FIFPro believes all affected parties may benefit (from) more time to remove the emotion, reflect and re-establish the facts in a calm and considered setting,” it said.

The punishment immediately ended Suarez’s involvement in the tournament in Brazil, with Uruguay due to face an in-form Colombia in a round of 16 tie on Saturday.

Suarez’s ban is the longest ever imposed at a World Cup. It means he is unlikely to appear in competitive matches for his country until 2016.

“He is totally distraught. He never thought the punishment would be so severe,” said Alejandro Balbi, a member of the Uruguayan Football Association’s board and Suarez’s lawyer.

As well as affecting international appearances, FIFA’s ruling will have a major impact on Suarez’s club career.

After a brilliant season for Premier League runners-up Liverpool, the prolific striker will miss his club’s opening domestic and European Champions League matches.

Suarez’s value in the transfer market, estimated to be at least £50m, could be affected should Liverpool decide to sell him, and his endorsement deals have begun to unravel.

On Friday, poker brand 888 cancelled its sponsorship deal with Suarez just weeks after he became one of the company’s brand ambassadors.

“Regrettably, following his actions during Uruguay’s World Cup match against Italy on Tuesday, 888poker has decided to terminate its relationship with Luis Suarez with immediate effect,” it said in a statement.

German sportswear firm Adidas stopped short of axing Suarez, but will not use him in any further World Cup marketing.

FIFA ruled that Suarez bit Chiellini during Uruguay’s final group match on Tuesday, as his side knocked Italy out of the tournament with a 1-0 victory.

His team mates and most Uruguayans jumped to defend him, believing the punishment was disproportionate.

“There are different standards. That’s what infuriates and hurts us most,” Mujica said on Thursday night in an appearance on a TV show hosted by former Argentine star Diego Maradona.

The outspoken Maradona went further, saying world soccer’s governing body might as well handcuff Suarez and lock him up in Guantanamo prison.

“Who did Suarez kill?” Maradona said. “This is football, this is contact… They may as well handcuff him and bring him to Guantanamo directly.”

By Clare Lovell

Wimbledon’s grass claimed its most notable victim so far when the women’s world No.2 Li Na exited the tournament on Friday and the lush lawns almost did for top men’s seed Novak Djokovic, who took an agonising tumble.

Two former champions also battled for supremacy in an ebb-and-flow classic on Centre Court. It was 2011 title holder Petra Kvitova who prevailed 5-7 7-6(2) 7-5 in the contest of big servers against five-times champion and crowd favourite Venus Williams.

While you could barely separate Kvitova and Williams, champion Andy Murray soothed home nerves with a one-sided and danger-free win over Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain 6-2 6-3 6-2.

Australian Open champion Li faced fired-up Czech Barbara Zahlavova Strycova, who has never before advanced beyond the third round of a grand slam.

The pair fought a tight two-hour-19-minute duel that could have gone either way, but the determined Czech held firmer in two tiebreaks to win 7-6(5) 7-6(5).

China’s Li, the second seed, said she felt she had not had enough practice on grass coming in to the tournament.

“It’s not only about technique. I think sometimes I don’t know how to play the point, especially in the important moment. I think today I made a lot of mistakes.”

Djokovic was cantering towards a regulation victory against Frenchman Gilles Simon on Centre Court when, with the score at 6-4 6-2 3-2, he slipped before flinging himself at a forehand.

He fell heavily and rolled on the turf clutching his shoulder and grimacing in pain.

His coach Boris Becker, so demonstrative as a player, was a picture of calm inscrutability until Djokovic’s fall. The German three-times champion stood up, leaned forward and watched anxiously as his charge received treatment.

After some shoulder manipulation by his chair, the Serb resumed as if nothing had happened and finished off Simon 6-4 6-2 6-4 with a characteristically athletic airborne smash.

“It was a sharp pain when I fell, an awkward fall,” the six-times grand slam champion said.

“I was just hoping there is nothing going on with the joint. Luckily, there is no damage and I could play.”

Djokovic, who consulted a doctor and had an ultrasound scan to confirm there was no damage, was able to joke that he would take diving lessons from Becker, renowned for grass court acrobatics during his playing career.

The world No.2 will now meet France’s Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, another fine tumbler, in Monday’s fourth round.

Women’s third seed Simona Halep suffered a less spectacular scare, dropping a set against unheralded Ukrainian Lesia Tsurenko in a delayed second-round match.

Halep, who has vaulted up the rankings over the past year and reached the French Open final this month, eventually saw off the world No.170 6-3 4-6 6-4, but not before throwing away two match points as she struggled with her nerves.

“You know, on grass it is not easy. Every match is difficult. You never know who will win or who will lose because of the court,” Halep said.

Forecast rain failed to arrive at Wimbledon, preferring perhaps to dump on the Glastonbury Festival 200 km to the west, but a swirling wind made serving problematic at times.

The wind did not prevent Kvitova and the 34-year-old Williams from treating spectators to a top-class demonstration of fast and powerful grasscourt tennis.

Venus had Kvitova on the ropes for much of the match, punching groundstroke winners on both sides of the court. But the Czech sixth seed, who has failed to find the form she showed in the three years since her triumph, found fresh legs during the tiebreak.

A disappointed Williams, who has suffered debilitating illness in recent years, said she would now concentrate on the doubles with sister Serena and had no intention of quitting tennis.

“I’m not getting out of here. I think this year has been a great year for me. I’ve had some tough losses, but I’ve learned a lot from them … I’m proud of myself for what I’m achieving on the court.”

Third seed Murray produced an accomplished display of all-court tennis, triumphing on his fourth match point on his Spanish opponent’s serve in one hour 35 minutes.

“There were a few things I could do better but it’s been a good first week,” said Murray, who has yet to drop a set. After last year’s title and the Olympic success in 2012 Murray is now on a 16-match winning streak at Wimbledon.

Murray next meets 2.03-metre tall South African Kevin Anderson, who beat Italian Fabio Fognini.

“He’s a big guy with a big serve, so I’ll have to be sharp for that one,” Murray said.

Battling Australian Leyton Hewitt bowed out of the tournament he won in 2002 – a year when Venus was runner-up to Serena - but not before giving 15th seed Jerzy Janowicz a thorough workout in a second-round match held over from Thursday.

Pole Janowicz, beaten by Murray in the semi-finals last year, prevailed 7-5 6-4 6-7(7) 4-6 6-3 and will meet Spaniard Tommy Robredo in the third round. He will be joined by compatriot and fourth seed Agnieszka Radwanska, who silenced Michelle Larcher De Brito, one of the noisiest grunters on the tour, 6-2 6-0.

It was Hewitt’s 42nd five-set grand slam match and gave the 33-year-old the record for most five-setters since the start of the professional era in 1968.

Queen’s Club champion Grigor Dimitrov, 10 years younger than Hewitt and with grand slam success in his sights, had to fight for his fourth-round spot in a 6-7(3) 6-4 2-6 6-4 6-1 tussle with Alexandr Dolgopolov.

The Bulgarian said his triumph in the Wimbledon warm-up event at Queen’s had given him extra hope and excitement after a five-set defeat last year.

“I’ve prided myself on some of the matches I’ve played so far. Some of my mental strength comes from that,” he said.

By Karolos Grohmann

Brazil goalkeeper Julio Cesar saved two spot-kicks in a shootout against Chile to send the hosts into the World Cup quarter-finals 3-2 on penalties following a pulsating 1-1 draw after extra time on Saturday.

Four years to the day since Brazil eliminated Chile at the same stage of the 2010 tournament, they did it again when Gonzalo Jara sent his spot-kick against the post after Cesar had twice denied the battling Chileans.

Five-times champions Brazil will next play the winners of the other last-16 match later on Saturday between Uruguay and Colombia.

David Luiz put Brazil ahead after 18 minutes but Alexis Sanchez equalised for Chile before halftime.

“It was complicated,” Cesar said in a television interview.

“The pressure of representing Brazil and playing at home is really great. We played well in the first half but after Chile equalised they got into the game.”

The Brazilians, who had eliminated their fellow South Americans in three previous World Cups, set a blistering pace from the start and Marcelo took a first crack at Chile with a volley that sailed wide.

Chile quickly lost the battle in midfield but their defence kept tournament joint top scorer Neymar in check.

They were helpless, though, when Neymar whipped in a corner in the 18th minute, Thiago Silva headed it on and David Luiz, with what looked like some help from Chile’s Jara, flicked it in for his first international goal in his 40th appearance.

POURING FORWARD

With the small red patches of Chile fans in the Mineirao stadium swallowed up by a vast sea of yellow shirts, five-times champions Brazil kept pouring forward and Neymar should have done better when he raced clear only to drive a low shot wide.

Chile, however, levelled 14 minutes later after making the most of a throw-in mixup between Hulk and Marcelo to send Alexis into the box and the forward drilling in to stun the crowd into temporary silence.

Neymar, deciding to take matters into his own hands, went agonisingly close with a header that scraped past the post and controlled a superb deep cross-field ball to set up Fred, who fired high.

Dani Alves tested Claudio Bravo with a thundering long-range effort but the Chile keeper did well to tip it over the bar.

Brazil, who had won nine of their previous 10 meetings with Chile, thought they had scored again early in the second half when Hulk controlled a deep cross to drill in but referee Howard Webb booked the winger for handball.

At the other end Cesar pulled off a sensational save to deny Charles Aranguiz from point-blank range in a pulsating game where players of both teams resembled tightrope walkers with no safety with one wrong pass proving costly.

Chile, running on empty in extra time, almost snatched a dramatic last-minute winner when Mauricio Pinilla rattled the crossbar with a tremendous shot.

David Luiz, Marcelo and Neymar converted their penalties for Brazil in the shootout and although Willian missed the target and Hulk’s effort was saved, Cesar denied Pinilla and Sanchez and when Jara sent his effort against the inside of the post the stadium erupted in celebration.

“It’s at time like this you get your support from friends and team mates and thanks to Julio who made great saves,” Hulk said.

“We ran till the end, God willing we will go to the end and make the final. We suffered but we made it. We knew this would be a very hard game, it went to extra time but even with cramps we ran till the end.”

By Gideon Long

ROBIN van Persie returns to the Dutch attack to face Mexico in the second round of the World Cup on Sunday while Mexican defender Hector Moreno will lock horns with his former mentor Louis van Gaal.

Van Persie was suspended for the Netherlands’ 2-0 defeat of Chile in their final group match but will be back to partner Arjen Robben in the tournament’s deadliest attacking duo.

The pair scored three each during the group stage as the Dutch romped into the last 16 with three victories and ten goals, more than any other team at the World Cup.

That rich vein of form makes them favourites against the Mexicans but their previous clashes have been remarkably even.

In six meetings, the Dutch have won three and the Mexicans two. Of the 22 goals in those matches – an average of nearly four a game – both sides scored 11, and their only previous meeting at the World Cup, in 1998, ended in a 2-2 draw.

Van Persie’s return means Dirk Kuyt is likely to be relegated to the bench after starting against Chile, but if he does play, either from the outset or as a substitute, the 33-year-old will win his 100th international cap.

At the other end of the age spectrum, 20-year-old forward Memphis Depay is also likely to start on the bench despite scoring twice in his two appearances.

“I must be realistic,” he told reporters at the Dutch training camp.

“With incredible players like Robben and Van Persie, it’s logical that I sit on the bench. If you see what Robben can do with dribbling the ball it’s unbelievable.”

The Mexicans are largely injury free and were impressive in the group stage, beating Croatia and Cameroon and holding Brazil to a goalless draw in Fortaleza’s Castelao arena, the setting for Sunday’s showdown against the Netherlands.

Their defender Moreno played under Van Gaal at Dutch side AZ Alkmaar and knows a thing or two about the talent in the Netherlands squad.

“They were young guys like me and they were just starting their careers when I was there,” said Moreno, who now plays his club football at Espanyol in Spain.

“They’ve grown up under the guidance of Van Gaal. With the players they have up front it’s going to be a very difficult match.”

Moreno said he hoped to hug the Dutch coach twice on Sunday – once before kickoff as a gesture of friendship and again after the final whistle to commiserate him in defeat.

The winners will face either Costa Rica or Greece in the quarter-finals and either side would fancy their chances of reaching the last four of the competition.

By Toby Davis

A SOLID defence used to be Greece’s modus operandi while Costa Rica traditionally relied on maverick individuals but the stereotypes have been shed in this World Cup where the two teams face a last-16 clash on Sunday night.

A World Cup quarter-final against either the Netherlands or Mexico is the prize on offer for both when they meet in the coastal Brazilian city of Recife.

Few predicted that either team would make it this far.

Costa Rica turned heads by finishing above Uruguay, Italy and England in ultra-competitive Group D, yet it was the manner in which the Central Americans accumulated seven points from their three games that proved the most surprising.

They were exceptionally organised at the back, ruthlessly quick and punchy on the break and nobody stood out as being more influential than the overall team ethic.

While the fleet-footed Joel Campbell provides the focal point in attack, the most impressive thing about Costa Rica is the speed at which they get bodies up to support the lone frontman, without leaving themselves exposed at the back.

Greece, who emerged into the knockout stages after a last-gasp Giorgos Samaras penalty gave them a 2-1 win over Ivory Coast to snatch the runners-up spot in Group C, looked anything but organised in their games.

They were porous at the back, as shown in an opening 3-0 defeat by Colombia, but sprightly in attack and generally more eager to go forward than in past tournaments, where a solid backline was usually the foundation on which they built.

Greece were caught out several times in their opener against group winners Colombia, with the players putting it down to nerves.

Against Ivory Coast, however, they arguably played their most aggressive game in years, and the two goals they scored equalled their tally for their eight previous World Cup games combined.

“We showed against Ivory Coast how well we can defend but also how good we can be in attack,” said Greece coach Fernando Santos, a former touchline chain smoker.

“We created a lot of chances and we kept attacking until the end. Even when we conceded the 74th minute equaliser, we continued to attack.”

Santos, who replaced Euro 2004 winning coach Otto Rehhagel in 2010 is not amused by continued claims that Greece only know how to defend.

“I can but laugh as it is a joke,” he said.

Like Costa Rica, they were nobody’s favourites to make it beyond the group stage.

Costa Rica midfielder Yeltsin Tejeda said: “We were thinking more about Colombia and the Ivory Coast and in the end came the least expected team. Now we have to change the video cassette.”

This is Greece’s first appearance in the World Cup knockout round, while Costa Rica have never been beyond the last 16.

The only previous time the Ticos reached this stage was in 1990 when, having come out of a group that included Brazil, Sweden and Scotland, they lost heavily to Czechoslovakia.

By Jack Shafer

At the rate I’m going, the number of people I follow on Twitter will have dropped from 640 to zero on July 13, after the last World Cup match concludes.

I’ve never been sentimental about Twitter, randomly unfollowing gassy and predictable feeds when flooded by their abundant and stupefying tweets, or pruning my list to make room for new voices. I can only assume that other Twitter devotees similarly budget their accounts, otherwise how could one keep up with the traffic?

Last month, soccer enthusiasts simplified the editing of my follow list by tweeting expansively about the World Cup. They published pre-game tweets.

They live-tweeted matches. They offered post-game tweets. They tweeted about soccer fashion, about the officials’ bad calls, about the stadiums, other fans, the weather, other tweets, and more.

If you’re a heavy Twitter user, you know what I’m talking about.

As a soccer agnostic, with no hatred for or interest in the game, these many tweets hold a negative value for me. So, on June 12, when Brazil took on Croatia in the first match, and fans filled Twitter with the written equivalent of a vuvuzela orchestra, I tweeted my minor rebellion: “If I unfollowed you, it’s because you tweeted about the World Cup. Nothing personal.”

Since that tweet, I’ve thinned my follow list by 140 accounts, down to 500. I’ve even unfollowed Twitter buddies for the misdemeanor of retweeting a benign World Cup tweet. As I write this during the United States vs. Germany match, I’m still unfollowing.

I’ve unfollowed most every Brit I know, including my Guardian pals Janine Gibson and Stuart Millar, for their World Cup tweets. After I Twitter-ditched my good friend Bill Gifford, he used Twitter to call for vigilante action against me, urging the soccer faithful to “cc #hater @jackshafer on your #WorldCup” tweets.

I’ve unfollowed other close friends, valued colleagues, academics, fellow Reuters employees, Twitter-wit NYTFridge, and others whose feeds amused or enlightened me until their World Cup pronouncements interceded.

But don’t blame me for over-reacting, blame them for over-sharing.

I, too, am a sports fan, so I understand the intensity of the soccer mob. Yet my sports devotions have never induced me into tweeting about games or matches. My opposition to sporting tweets, while deep, is not absolute.

You’ve got to expect a Twitter din during college football bowl season, the World Series, Wimbledon, the Masters, the Triple Crown, the Stanley Cup, the Super Bowl, and other events.

But none of these spectacles run on for a month like the World Cup.

To put my complaint in perspective, suppose the frat boys in the apartment below yours threw a noisy, one-night kegger. You could probably endure it without calling the police.

But what if they held a kegger every afternoon and every evening for a month, and even when they weren’t drinking and screaming, they were singing songs about drinking?

Even if you liked beer and were invited to their parties, you would not last long before calling 911.

Social media encourages writers toward conciseness and cleverness, the better to attract a larger audience. But these rules have dissolved during the World Cup interregnum.

Ordinarily smart people are typing “Goooooaaaaall!!!!!” into Twitter as if other soccer fans are blind to what they just saw on TV. In an earlier era, sports fans limited their victory dancing to their own living rooms or, if exuberance swayed them, went into the streets to tip cars over and set them on fire. How I miss those good times.

The secret of Twitter’s appeal, like the appeal of other communications technologies – Facebook, text, email, the phone, the telegraph, the postal letter – is that it gives everyman the opportunity to fill the human need to say, “I am here.” Ever since the first cave-painter pressed his hand in paint and palmed his print on the rock, we’ve been finding new ways to say “I am here.”

For that reason, I should probably be a little less critical of the average soccer fan’s desire to connect and commune with their comrades via Twitter. I should put my head down until mid-July, and stop my complaining.

But uh-uh. You’re free to tweet what you want to tweet, and I’m free to unfollow whom I want to unfollow. Consider this column my can of black spray-paint, aerosoling your soccer tweets into oblivion. For the time being, you’re not here.

Jack Shafer is a Reuters columnist covering the press and politics

By Nicholas Wapshott

Suddenly, it seems, the world is at war.

In Iraq, armed and angry militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) are at the gates of Baghdad. In Pakistan, government forces are mounting a ferocious campaign against the Taliban in North Waziristan.

In Syria, the civil war drags on. These are “hot wars” involving the clashing of troops and weapons. Having escaped such “hot” conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, these are the sort of war Americans have made it plain they are not prepared to fight.

But there are other wars going on. In Yemen, a forgotten war against an al Qaeda outcrop continues, largely fought with lethal US drones. In Ukraine, Moscow is undermining the Kiev government by stealth.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, anxious not to press his luck after successfully snatching Crimea from Kiev, is like a fox sliding through the hen coop, careful not to set off the alarm. He is being countered by targeted sanctions imposed by the United States and the European Union.

These are “cold wars” – a contemporary variation on the 40-plus years of Cold War fought to a standstill by the United States and the Soviet Union.

The very nature of war has changed since the hauling down of the Berlin Wall in 1989. As the Cold War raged with often imperceptible intensity, the two sides mounted “hot wars” by proxy in minor theatres – the most prominent and punishing for the United States being Vietnam, a “cold war” first fought with teams of US advisers, war materiel and money that became “hot”.

Before long, the heat became too intense for the American people and their children, who were conscripted to fight, and they called for a halt.

Even so, it took many years to wind down. And when the last Americans scrambled out of Saigon, the city had already fallen to the Viet Cong and been dubbed Ho Chi Minh City.

Every U.S. war since the tragedy of Vietnam has been judged against that bruising conflict. It was even assumed for a while that Washington would never take part in a hot war again.

Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s occupation of Kuwait in 1990, however, threatened the U.S. national interest, and President George H.W. Bush decided to take the oil-rich nation back by force.

With memories of our bloody entanglement in Vietnam still ringing in his ears, Bush stopped the Gulf War a little way over the Iraq border.

Rather than go all-out for Baghdad and mount an occupation by U.S. forces, Bush opted for turning Hussein’s hot war into a cold one. Financial and economic sanctions, a no-fly zone, a tightly regulated oil-for-aid market and other restrictive international measures kept Hussein trapped like a house fly in double glazing.

The Gulf War may have been the last hot war the United States ever fought had it not been for the al Qaeda attacks of September 11, 2001, and the need within the George W. Bush administration to demonstrate that America would not let such ignominious attacks go unanswered.

Afghanistan was a no-brainer: Osama bin Laden trained his terrorists there and the Taliban had allowed them safe haven. In a mood of controlled rage, Americans saw little wrong with waging a hot war against the killers who were out to get them.

Iraq was different. There is no space here to relitigate the casus belli of that war in Iraq and whether Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction were real or imagined, but the upshot was that U.S. forces set out on their second simultaneous hot war.

Bush soon discovered, however, what his father already knew: involving U.S. troops in a hot war in Iraq was punishing.

President Barack Obama then rode an anti-war wave into the presidency. Ever since, a conspicuously silent Bush has left Vice President Dick Cheney to defend the unnecessary war they chose to fight in Iraq.

The heavy toll of waging two wars at the same time, and the steady stream of caskets bringing home the U.S. war dead, appear to have persuaded Americans that they are no longer prepared to take part in another hot war. That is certainly the message Congress gives whenever Obama gets close to acting militarily on his own.

When it came to deciding whether to intervene in Syria, Obama appeared weak by hesitating. His decision to let Congress take the final decision, though, confirmed what was already evident: Americans are in no mood for a hot war.

The notion of waging a cold war, however, has taken a new direction since the collapse of the Soviet Union. In the old Cold War, the West had limited means of exerting its influence over the economies of the Soviet Union and its satellites because the communists operated a command economy virtually divorced from the West.

The threat of economic sanctions meant little to a Kremlin that lived beyond the reach of the market.
Since the end of Soviet communism, however, globalization has changed everything.

Now instead of condemning a whole population to inconvenience, shortages and penury, targeted sanctions can make life difficult only for the people making bad decisions.

The range of the banking and financial systems now ensures that Washington can call the shots when it comes to dodging sanctions or laundering money — as Credit Suisse and the French bank BNP Paribas have learned at vast cost.

Cold wars are slow to win. But the punishment they deliver is more accurate and more effective than the old-school Cold War. Putin, for example, knows he has a limited time before he must bring his Ukraine adventure to a close and nurture a rule of law.

For as long as he persists, Russia will lose its most talented citizens as they flee arbitrary justice, lack of freedom of expression, fixed elections and all other aspects of Russian life that offends talented people.

In Soviet days, high-value Russians were confined to the Soviet Union simply by being refused exit visas.
Obama may have ridden an anti-war wave to become president.

But once in the White House, while drawing down the hot wars, he has waged cold wars with vigor — much to the dismay of many supporters.
Obama’s use of drones, particularly in North Waziristan and Yemen, has been ruthless.

He is even prepared to kill American-born terrorists with drones. In response to the Crimea annexation and Moscow’s surreptitious invasion of eastern Ukraine, he has levied stern controls and restrictions on the Russian top brass.

When European leaders meet later this week, they are expected to weigh extending sanctions to broad sectors of the Russian economy as well as wider circles surrounding Putin.

To mount a hot war has been a last resort for most presidents and it is hard to imagine what pressing circumstances today would cause a president to mount an operation as complex and dangerous as the war in Iraq.

But if the United States is to maintain its influence around the globe, and keep terrorists well away from its shores, presidents of either party must be prepared to wage endless cold wars.

To abandon war altogether would be to acknowledge that the American people’s desire for peace had left it pitiful and powerless.

Reuters’ columnist Nicholas Wapshott’s The Sphinx: Franklin Roosevelt, the Isolationists and the Road to World War Two will be published in November by WW Norton.

By Constantinos Hadjistassou

The Russian Federation’s annexation of the Crimea has reawakened the spectre of EU energy security, bringing back memories of the 2006 and 2009 energy rows between Russia and the Ukraine.

The 2009 dispute resulted in the cutting off of natural gas supply to eastern European countries, such as Romania, Bulgaria and Poland. It was the first time that the flow of natural gas from the Soviet pipeline grid to European countries was completely shut down.

The hampered flow of natural gas dealt an irreversible blow to Russia’s credibility; Russia was stigmatized as using gas as a tool for political and economic blackmail.

The move also raised questions as to the uncertainty of gas supply and the fickleness of energy contracts. Certainly the relationship between Russia and Europe is mutual.

On the one hand, Russia to a large degree depends financially on oil and natural gas exports, which account for 70 per cent of its exports and for 50 per cent of the revenues of the federal budget. On the other hand, Russian natural gas imports account for about 30 per cent of the EU’s energy needs.

Although much is made of the EU’s dependence on Russian energy, there is no doubt – and this can be documented – that Russia is financially reliant on the EU.

In this respect Russia understands that it is not in its interest to disrupt its relatively good relations with EU countries, its major trading partners. Otherwise stated, keeping a balance is key to both sides.

It’s also noteworthy that although the EU imports 35 per cent of its oil needs and only 30 per cent of its natural gas needs, the bloc is almost exclusively preoccupied with natural gas.

This can be explained by the fact that supplies of oil (and petroleum by-products) may be secured from alternative sources should Russia halt sales to the EU. Moreover, oil can easily be transported aboard tankers, from oil fields to refineries and then onto points of consumption.

Even more significantly, Saudi Arabia, the largest OPEC oil producer, is a swing producer and is able to step into a supply vacuum and prevent a shortage.

Something along those lines occurred in the price row during the 1979 oil crisis, when oil production was scaled back with the outbreak of the Iraq-Iran war.

By contrast, natural gas is chiefly transported via pipeline, and in the event of reduced flows it is very difficult to make up for shortages.

In the wake of the Russia-Ukraine energy crisis of 2009, the EU placed a great deal of emphasis on beefing up its energy security.

In brief, the EU’s so-called “third energy package” consisted of expanding the links among the European natural gas pipeline network, ensuring two-way flows of natural gas in the pipelines, expanding the connections in the electricity grid, diversification of supply and energy-saving.

On a national level, countries like Poland and Lithuania have gone ahead with building liquefied natural gas-receiving terminals, while other countries such as Latvia have increased their natural gas storage capacity.

The numbers prove, however, that the EU is still a ways off from achieving its stated goal of energy security. By way of example, today Bulgaria imports 89 per cent of its natural gas needs from Russia; Slovakia 83 per cent; Greece 56 per cent; and Estonia 100 per cent.

Given this balance, the EU should reassess its energy policy with regard to natural gas imports, in relation to energy routes, quantities, costs and suppliers.

The United States, its confidence growing as a result of a surge in shale oil and gas production from fracking, is pressing the EU to wean itself off Russian natural gas in order to isolate Russia.

The EU, however, recognizing that its short-term options for replenishing its energy needs are limited, has justifiably opted for a more moderate stance toward Russia.

While the energy crisis between the Ukraine and Russia over price rows and outstanding payments is in full swing, the interruption of natural gas supplies to the Ukraine – and to Europe by extension – remains a clear and present danger.

Under the circumstances, what preventative steps can the EU take to mitigate the risks?

One step could be to continue operating the nuclear power plants which Germany has promised to shut down by 2022. Another would be to use coal for electricity generation, as well as broadening the use of renewable energy sources.

Lifting inter-state restrictions on the transport of electrical power could also cover any extra electricity needs that may arise. Then there are energy-saving measures, such as encouraging people to modify their consumption behaviours, and incentives to limit electricity usage during peak hours.

Releasing strategic natural gas reserves can also plug any holes, as can an increase in imports of liquefied natural gas at receiving terminals. Yet the anticipated drop in global natural gas prices is likely to prove the toughest test of the EU’s resolve in applying the lessons learned in the past.

Constantinos Hadjistassou is a lecturer at the University of Nicosia and a researcher with the KIOS Centre, University of Cyprus.

By Hermes Solomon

HOW WILL our major banks survive and return to profitability when NPLs hugely outweigh ‘real’ capital assets and any economic upturn seems unlikely.

Our president and finance minister are talking the economy up at every opportunity (conferences, media ‘splash’, hustings and even at liturgies from the pulpit) without proffering substantial evidence of an upturn now or in the immediate future.

Is returning to world bond markets more significant than creating jobs?

Does our minister of labour seek to establish a minimum income in anticipation of prolonged high unemployment or is she provisionally peddling brioche to the poor in the certainty her ‘botched’ bill will not receive legislative approval?

UK government controlled banks have progressed little since the banking collapse, the government only recently relinquishing part of its 75 per cent holding in LloydsTSB – TSB set afloat on the UK stock market, its share soaring by 12 per cent in the first day’s trading.

HBOS (Halifax Bank of Scotland), taken under government control in 2009 was, from 2004 to 2009, the second largest shareholder in the Bank of China, itself the world’s fifth largest bank by market capitalisation in 2008.

Before the 2008 banking collapse, RBS Group was very briefly the largest bank in the world and for some time the second largest bank in the UK and Europe (fifth in stock market value), and the fifth largest in the world by market capitalisation.

Subsequently, with a slumping share price and major loss of confidence, the bank fell sharply in the rankings.

The Bank of Cyprus’ downfall in a tiny way has emulated RBS; it was and still is the largest bank in Cyprus, and although it grew wings throughout Greece, Russia and the Balkans prior to its crash, it is now hopelessly overstretched and unlikely to regain anywhere near its former stature.

Like its ‘partner in crime’ the co-op, the Bank of Cyprus faces as difficult a future as HBOS, which has been struggling unprofitably for the past six years even though the UK economy is reportedly booming due to foreign investment and soaring house prices in the south east.

So why should we expect any of our major banks to return to profit or the economy to growth in the foreseeable future when we are years into high unemployment and house prices continue to slide?

Unless interest rates to borrowers are drastically reduced and capital injected by recovering NPLs, our banks will remain in the doldrums, ‘real’ unemployment continue to rise and this economy splutter helplessly no matter what politicians say.

This past twenty years our banks have been grossly inefficient, overstaffed and criminally ‘boarded’.

But when it comes to criminality, it’s been the same worldwide, so our banks can’t be blamed for joining the queue of money launderers, sleight of hand loan contractors, dishonest foreign exchange dealers, worthless bond issuers and outrageous embezzlers of depositors’ savings.

But our banks can be blamed for being ‘caught’! They joined the ‘champion’s league’ of bankers in the year 2004 and by 2013 the ‘champion’s league’ had crushed them.

There’s no pretending that most world banks are any more solvent than our banks, but they have free access to funds and government support whereas our government is stony broke – the European Central Bank and IMF now calling the shots.

HBOS and Lloyds, among others from ‘the champion’s league’, have been fined heavily by regulators for rigging Libor and selling worthless bonds.

Banks worldwide have lost public confidence and depositors have grown increasingly wary. Moving assets to stock markets or commodities will give savers temporary respite, but a ‘greater financial crisis’ is definitely on the cards.

Last week I dealt with Lloyds Telephone Banking 24/7 service and was offered 1.1846 euros for one pound sterling when the currency market commercial rate was sitting at 1.25 euros. I refused the offer and went immediately to my Lloyds online account, where I was offered 1.2035 – a disparity of two cents.

I called Lloyds Telephone Banking to inform them of the ‘criminal’ disparity of rates within the same bank and for the same transaction, whereby they offered to pay me 33 pounds for discovering ‘their error’ and a further 15 pounds for the inconvenience.

Bank commissions have crept up – in the ‘old days’, one or one and half per cent commission was normal, but now they take anything up to five per cent. And on top of that Lloyds charges 20 pounds for a telephoned currency transfer and only ten for the same online.

The telephone dealer’s name was given as Sungi. She spoke with a pronounced Indian accent and I wondered whether I was dealing with a Lloyds Forex set-up in India and not the UK at all.

Some other examples of chicanery for you: Bank of Cyprus bank account statements, which are posted three weeks out of date, are charged at two euros fifty a statement – creeping charges!

A sterling account holder at BoC sought to withdraw funds in sterling. She was told by her local branch manager that she must first convert the sterling into euros then purchase sterling – double ‘inflated’ commissions for the bank.

A bank ‘on the other side’ charges 44 euros annually for a euro account credit/debit card and when employed on ‘this side’ double commission is charged for conversion – euro account to Turkish lira then Turkish lira back to euro – gobbledygook.

Banking practices worldwide have become ‘sleight of hand’ orientated so let’s stop pretending that our banks alone get up to mischief.

You must now study your bank statements, the bank’s terms and conditions and remain alert at every turn. And with low depositor interest rates here taxed at 30 per cent I recommend you close all unnecessary accounts.

I had five with the Bank of Cyprus and now only two of which I no longer receive statements.

Stay awake or you will be robbed by today’s Dick Turpins!

By Loucas Charalambous

AT THE end of May last year, the then defence minister Fotis Fotiou leaked information that the government planned to buy two frigates to protect our exclusive economic zone (EEZ) from the Turks.

Some of ‘his people’ at newspapers announced, amid much fanfare, that with the purchase of the two frigates our natural gas would be secure and we would not need to worry about the Turkish threats.

Thankfully, there was a strong reaction by all those who realised that this purchase had much more to do with the commissions that would be paid and the government was forced to drop the plan.

Today, a year later, the appetite for a new armaments pay-day has been re-awakened. According to a report in Phileleftheros, a new plan for defending our EEZ was presented to the House foreign affairs committee earlier this month.

The paper did not explain why, this time, the foreign affairs committee was briefed about the matter instead of the defence committee.

According to this briefing, the government was promoting a scheme for the “more effective exercise of our rights in our EEZ”, because, supposedly, with the means at its disposal today it can only exercise control over only half the sea to the south and west of the island.

The paper said the purchase of radar systems was also under consideration, as was that of floating and “modern, Cyprus-made, flying means of surveillance”.

I do not know who leaked this utter nonsense that reflects the lack of seriousness of those governing us.

Personally, it is the first time I have heard about the existence of “Cyprus-made flying means of surveillance”.

If Cyprus has reached such a technological level, manufacturing flying means of surveillance, it is a very big advance for the country, and I am very surprised President Anastasiades has not found the time to announce this fantastic news, given he has time to visit every corner of Cyprus to open neighbourhood clubs, supermarkets and grocery stores.

The argument of the person briefing the House foreign affairs committee made a particular impression on me. According to the Phileleftheros report, he used the following ingenious argument: “The improved monitoring within the EEZ would have a positive effect on foreign companies that are interested or will be interested in the future in the energy sources of the region.”

In other words, the foreign firms that showed little interest in our gas because of the Turkish threats would now rush to extract natural gas as they would feel protected by the radar systems, boats and means of modern surveillance that are produced in Cyprus.

I am beginning to fear that Anastasiades and Fotiou are seriously overestimating their powers.

They can fool journalists and naive Cypriots as much as they want, but they cannot work on the assumption that bosses of big oil companies in Cyprus are complete idiots that can be treated in the same way.

The bosses of the oil and gas companies know very well that if Turkey decided, at some point, to prevent us extracting any natural gas from our EEZ nobody would be able to stop her.

This is why the oil company bosses have been biding their time in the hope we would resolve our differences with Turkey.

There was another peculiar aspect of this story. Phileleftheros did not just report the story but also editorialised in favour of the spending of millions on these purchases, the only justification for which are the backhanders.

The paper has even pre-emptively criticised those who were likely to oppose the purchase on the grounds that “defence spending was a waste of money,” stupidly, asking “how will the country be able to exercise its sovereign rights?”

For me this is the most worrying part. When Phileleftheros joins the game, supporting those who are trying to generate commissions for themselves through unnecessary defence spending, I fear that scam has been very well planned.

Former ambassador of Cyprus Andrestinos Papadopoulos interviews Austrian Ambassador Karl Muller

How does Austria view recent developments in the Cyprus problem and energy in terms of the European framework?

I think that for several reasons, the political environment can be seen as relatively more conducive to a settlement than in 2004 or 2008. In the two years I have been in Cyprus I have already experienced changes in people’s attitudes, not least because of the change of government and the effects of the economic crisis.

First of all, the majority of the main powers and big players in the vicinity want reconciliation to happen.

The USA has invested its prestige; American political representatives have put remarkable political capital and considerable efforts into promoting a resolution of “the Cyprus Problem”.

The UK and France have also done or are doing a lot to create a positive dynamic for these negotiations. Israel has turned from being a mere neighbour and bystander into a political and economic partner and friend of the Republic.

After a kind of twilight period, Turkey seems to be much keener on a solution now and more eager to engage positively with the EU.

I also think that Egypt as a traditionally close partner of Cyprus has an important role to play and this can and will be constructive.

Secondly, the main political forces in the Republic, the Orthodox Church and not least the general population as a whole are clearly more strongly inclined towards a fair settlement now than a couple of years ago.

There are many positive developments resulting from the ongoing work of engaged and committed NGOs, especially in restoration and other mainly cultural heritage projects.

Thirdly, like never before, and partly due a groundswell from the grassroots level, many individuals and mayors and other representatives from the divided communities north and south are working together on projects at the local level which make a difference in people’s lives.

As many examples from other parts of the world have proved: all really fruitful political endeavours have a strong local component. So this is very heartening.

An exclusive economic zone is just that: exclusive. Still, the hydrocarbon finds off the coast of Cyprus and nearby seem to be propitious to the peace process for anybody approaching the indubitable link between these two issues in a reasonable way.

But as Cyprus has repeatedly shown in the past, chances can be missed. It would be a real tragedy if instead of being a boon this became another battlefield.

Over the years our bilateral relations have reached remarkable levels. Can you give us an overall assessment of these relations and how do you see them expanding in the future?

Austria values its friendship with Cyprus very highly.

On most crucial foreign policy issues Cyprus and Austria see eye to eye. Both countries, for instance, now have good and even cordial relations with most Arab countries and with Israel at the same time.

On Iran and the Russian Federation both take a fairly moderate stance, without however acting against common EU positions.

Austria has a long tradition of closely cooperating with Cyprus in international bodies like the Council of Europe or the CSCE and OSCE.

The two countries have frequently supported each other’s candidatures for international organisations for a long time. I am confident that in the near future this already very good political collaboration will be strengthened further.

We have a great deal of mutual trust and experience to build on.

There is still room for improvement in the field of economic cooperation, although here too there have been many developments: most new modern water and sewage treatment plants on the island have recently been built by Austrian companies, and Austrian enterprises have been cooperating in the building and reconstruction of the Vasilikos power station.

Trade, mutual investment, energy and the environment, collaboration in vocational training, education and research, in tourism and medicine are all, in my view, offering the biggest, as yet untapped, potential and mutual benefits.

I see the creation and enhancement of these bilateral relationships as a very important part of my job here.

Austria has always been active in the field of foreign policy. What are its challenges at present, especially in view of what is happening in Ukraine?

The main foreign policy priority for Austria in the last two decades has always been to extend the European zone of political stability and economic prosperity eastward and especially to the area south east of its borders.

Therefore, its main goal is to see the full integration of all the countries of former Yugoslavia and of Albania into the EU as soon as possible. Apart from its cooperation with the countries of the Alpine region, Austria is especially active in the EU Strategy for the Danube Region, all the way to its partners Romania and Bulgaria.

Another region of great interest to Austria, partly overlapping with the Danube region, is the Black Sea Region, which also includes Moldova, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Most of these countries including those European countries which joined the EU in 2004 and later are comparatively the most important destinations for Austrian foreign direct investment.

The Laender (provinces) of Austria are participating in a varied and increasing number of trans-national regional cooperation organisations.

Within certain legal parameters they are allowed by the Austrian federal constitution to autonomously sign agreements within such cooperation frameworks. One example is the so-called Centrope Region, linking territorial entities (all with a different constitutional status) of Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary.

Moreover, Austria as a whole co-operates regionally more closely in different formats with neighbouring countries. One such grouping encompasses, for instance, Switzerland, Slovenia and Liechtenstein.

Austria has strong political and commercial links, with strong trade and investment, with both the Ukraine and the Russian Federation. So it is no surprise that the Austrian President Heinz Fischer met President Poroshenko a few days after his election and attended his inauguration, and that President Putin visited Austria for a bilateral visit on June 24.

Dialogue and the readiness to talk to each other are particularly important in the present phase. Austria is ready to contribute as much as it can to calming the present tensions. One offer, which has been accepted by the Ukrainian (at first, interim) government in the last few months, was to inform and advise it on the basis of our past experience about the legal foundations, prerequisites and the political ramifications of the Austrian Permanent Neutrality.

In the wake of May’s European elections, the future shape of the EU has become a major focus. How do you view the expectations of Europe’s citizens?

The European elections have indeed shown that the mainstream political centre (including smaller pro-European fractions like the liberals) has increasing difficulties in defending a positive view of the EU against the more critical and populist fringes of the political spectrum.

Saying that, it has become obvious that the reasons for the big protest vote were multifaceted.

Very often, they had to do with weak performances of national governments in office and not so much with bad policies devised by Brussels, or with any lack of democratic legitimacy and transparency of EU institutions.

But the aspirations of citizens have to be better addressed. And promises from before the elections must be honoured after Election Day.

That is why I think that the Austrian government has correctly, from the very beginning, clearly stated that Jean Claude Juncker must be candidate of the European Parliament for heading the Commission.

A new openness should prevail and show all European citizens that decisions which risk being seen as backroom deals (even if taken by heads of governments) can no longer invalidate the direct democratic voice and choice of the people.

By Alexia Evripidou

THE ENERGETIC buzz of teenage voices reverberates playfully throughout Larnaca airport’s departure lounge. Hormonal boys and girls, ranging from 14 to18 years of age, banter, laugh, tease and flirt excitedly, waiting to board the night flight to Oslo.

On the surface, these English speaking teenagers seem like a regular bunch of friends. But they are more than just that; they are 17 hand picked Greek and Turkish Cypriot members of Peace Players International Cyprus (PPI-CY), carefully chosen to participate in the Lead for Peace project in Nesodden, Norway.

Connected by the love of basketball, they prepare for a week long programme of basketball, coaching Norwegian youths, learning about conflict resolutions and making Norwegian pancakes.

After the group lands in Oslo, an early morning bus takes the teens to Nesodden, winding through still lakes and luscious greenery whilst the visitors chat together plainly in awe of the Norwegian landscape.

One would never guess that they are from different sides of a divided country. Thanks to PPI-CY and the Norwegian Nesodden Basketball Club (NBC), they have enabled a space where these friendships can blossom into a safe and encouraging environment, with a little help from basketball.

The only evident problem between the youths is the language barrier as some struggle to express themselves clearly in English. But as Greek coach from Promitheas basketball team, Nick Nakis, informed the group: “basketball is the language here”.

With over 270 members this year and more than 3,000 since it was founded in 2006, PPI-CY is all about creating strong, confident and happy children, the well rounded leaders of tomorrow.

It uses “basketball to help Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot children play together, learn together and build positive relationships that can overcome generations of mistrust and formidable physical barriers to interaction”.

Discovering an unexpected meeting of minds in Norway, the project received a massive boost in April 2013 when the PPI-CY and NBC forged links.

Norwegian ambassador of Greece and Cyprus, Sjur Larsen, contacted Gøril Wold Wægger; chief executive and manager of the Nesodden Basketball club in Norway, and asked her if she would arrange to host a bevy of Cypriots.

Peace Players with Norwegian junior and senior basketball players

With funding from the Norwegian Embassy, the 2013 project was a success. Cypriot children got to spend a week in the warm generosity of Norwegian homes whose children also participated in the project.

The kids got to compete at the Hansa Cup in Bergen, one of Norway’s biggest basketball tournaments. For the first time in nearly 40 years, Greek and Turkish Cypriot children, played together outside of Cyprus as a united Cypriot team.

They returned home proudly boasting a well deserved silver medal.

The ball had definitely begun to roll and NBS and PPI-CY put their heads together to plan further collaboration. In March this year, the plan for ‘Lead for Peace’ came to life with ten Norwegian youths visiting and being hosted by Cypriot families on both sides of the border.

The visit strongly moved both Gøril and the Norwegian children. Gøril saw the reality of what Cypriot children had to experience. “I read about the situation in Cyprus, but I was not prepared for the shock of seeing children having to cross borders with passports daily to go to school.

But when I met the children of Peace Players, there were no borders between them. They play and co-operate together,” she said. “What the children are learning now through PPI-CY can help avoid further wars. These are the kids that will be going into politics and education; they can influence the future.”

More determined than ever, both groups began to prepare for the Cypriots’ June visit to Norway, by applying for funding.

This was the beginning of the 18 month project, which in turn, is part of PPI-CY’s Leadership Programme (set to inspire youths to cultivate social awareness and teach them skills to be young leaders).

For the Lead for Peace project, 30 children – 10 from each community, Norway, Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots – were chosen. The project’s aim is to encourage children to ‘step up’ and help their individual communities, whilst empowering the children and inspiring others around them.

The youths are assigned a mentor to guide and support them. Projects range from helping local disabled children to cleaning up basketball courts.

This runs simultaneously with the basketball, allowing children to connect physically, putting aside language and cultural boundaries.
One of PPI-CY’s first employers Andreas Koulendis and basketball coach explained how these young leaders from Cyprus chosen for the project, are the children that generally have been with PPI-CY the longest.

“They understand the Lead for Peace project. They study and they’ve worked in bi-communal groups. They live the philosophy and now they are being helped to close the circle by coaching other children basketball, whilst still being coached themselves. The aspiration is that these kids will go on to coach for PPI-CY and continue making a difference,” he said.

“PPI-CY is using the present to build something for the future”.

Fortunately, with much hard-work and determination, the two organisers secured 21,000 euros in funding from a Norwegian organisation called Youth in Action (part of Erasmus+). This helped ensure the Cypriot teens got to Norway this week.

After some long sweaty days, the Cypriot visit to Norway came to an end yesterday.

The teenagers spent their time coaching junior children basketball, playing matches with the senior kids, winning the national tournament against the Norwegian children, exploring local food, celebrating midsummer and working with Conflict Resolution Specialist Roar Thun Wægger from whom they learned the art of communication and dialogue.

This however, is only part of the whole picture. Stephanie Nichols, Peace Player’s co-coordinator is encouraging parents to come along and see all the other projects running throughout the year.

“Anyone can join, there are no fees for basketball practices, nor do children need to know how to play,” she said. Working with both communities, PPI-CY offer bi-yearly mixed tournaments, leadership weekends, fortnightly twinning matches (where both communities join forces to form two mixed Cypriot teams), bi-weekly mono-communal basketball practices and an annual six day summer camp, which allow the children the space and techniques to really bond (next on July 30-August 4).

Whether in Norway or Cyprus, as Nick Nakis wisely pointed out: “the children show us that nothing needs to separate us, in fact there are many things that can unite us.”

Basketball just happens to be a good start.

For further information, take a look at Peace Players website: http://www.peaceplayersintl.org/our-programs/cyprus

By Evie Andreou

THE APPALLING exam results announced earlier in the week were a combination of failures within the school system, exam levels far above what students are taught, and a huge drop off in afternoon lessons due to the financial crisis, educators have told the Sunday Mail.

In the Pancyprian exams, average student grades fell below the pass mark in two subjects and hovered around the pass/fail mark in four others. In total, among the 8,570 registered candidates, of which 215 were no-shows, approximately one in two (4,139) students scored below the pass mark of 10, and 3,605 got between 10 and 15.

In addition, 804 candidates got grades from 16 to 18, and 22 candidates scored 19 to 20.

The results, which were as poor as last year, came within weeks of the publication of the World Bank Report on the educational system, which was found to be teacher-centric with results not commensurate with the amount of money spent on education as a percentage of GDP.

To compound the continued general failure of the system, the financial crisis has taken a huge toll on afternoon lessons, once a mainstay of Cypriot education, which likely has served to mask the weaknesses in the system for years, though not all educators believe that is the main reason.

While it would be difficult to compile exact figures since many state teachers moonlight illegally as afternoon tutors, some legally registered institutes say they have seen a 40-50 per cent drop in attendees over the past two years due to the crisis.

Others appear to have offset such a huge fall as other parents now opt for state school with additional afternoon lessons instead of paying for expensive private schools.

“Cypriot parents invest a lot of money on ensuring that their children receive the best education, even if that means paying money for afternoon private lessons,” the World Bank report notes. “A recent survey in Europe has shown that Cyprus is the second country among the European countries in investing money on private tutoring.”

But has the lucrative bubble now burst?

The Liperi M Educational Centre in Larnaca, which prepares students for the Pancyprian exams said they had seen enrolments fall by 40-50 per cent the two last years.

The Neorama institute in Nicosia said the same. Others, like the Cubic Maths Institute in Limassol said they had seen a slight decrease in enrolments due to the crisis, while Iacovos Stylianou, the manager of Intercity, an institute chain in Nicosia said they had reduced tuition fees and the enrolments were pretty much at the same level as previous years.

Andreas Constantinou from Paphos, the owner of the Aristo-Telio Institute, which teaches Greek language, said it was irrelevant whether students attended institutes or not.

He puts the failures down to state teachers.

“The school system is a very good one and we are paying dearly for it. It is the lack of its application by the teachers that is the problem,” he said. “There should be a constant evaluation of the teachers to test their efficiency in class in order to understand where things go wrong”.

This very point was made in the World Bank Report, which called for more and earlier evaluations for teachers, who generally are not evaluated until they have been ten years or so on the job.

Constantinou said there were too many school principals and deputy principals and high-ranking educators wrapped up in paper work who do not produce sufficient class work.

Andreas Neophytou, owner of ‘To Oikonomiko’ a private institute in Limassol, which has been teaching accounting and political economy for 30 years said that he too had seen a huge fall in enrollments, even though they had cut fees by 30-40 per cent.

He doesn’t believe however that this drop in afternoon lessons is the biggest reason for the poor results, but the level of difficulty of the Pancyprian exams.

“Even though this [drop in private lessons] may have affected results to some extent, the reason why students don’t perform well in the Pancyprian exams is because the level is higher than what used to be the school leaving exams,” Neophytou said.

He said he knew this would happen when the Pancyprian exams were introduced in 2006.

The Pancyprian exams are the unification of what used to be the school leaving exam and the university entrance exam, the level of which is higher, he said, adding that there was no longer a listof questions for students to choose from.

“Now they have to answer all questions in the exam paper, which makes things more difficult for them,” Neophytou said.

Alkisti Varnava, deputy head of the state secondary school teachers union OELMEK, told the Sunday Mail that the lack of private lessons was not the reason students were failing.

“We had poor results last year and the year before that. There are many reasons,” she said.

Varnava also pointed the finger at the Pancyprian exam saying ever since it was introduced results had taken a turn for the worse. They were on a whole other level, she said, adding that there needed to be more coordination between teachers, those who draw up the exams and those who correct them so that the content is closer to the school curriculum.

The OELMEK representative said the system needed a different approach because students were on unfamiliar ground with the Pancyprian exam.

Despite the opinion that afternoon lessons did not have a big impact on exam results, the World Bank report noted the correlation, saying that an anticipated increase in enrollment in higher education following the merging of the two exams, did not follow, “which has fueled concerns about the inequitable implications of private tutoring,” it said, suggesting that those who took afternoon lessons had a better chance of passing the more difficult exam and securing a university place.

SO THE police would like residents to form neighbourhood watches (Sunday Mail, June 22)? Well, there were two burglaries in short succession in the block of flats next to the one in which I live in our quiet and previously crime-free suburban area, so the people in our little road reached a verbal understanding that we would henceforth look out for one another’s homes and immediately report absolutely anything suspicious to the police. This appears to be more or less what a neighbourhood watch scheme is about.
Last month (May 20 to be precise), just as I was leaving the main exit to our block, I heard a burglar alarm starting to ring in the block next door, the one where there had recently been two burglaries. I went to have a look and saw that it was ringing at a ground-floor flat and peered over the high fence round the small garden to see if I could detect any signs of a break-in, which I couldn’t. However, remembering our promise, I rushed back home and immediately phoned the police station responsible for our area (Yermasoyia). I explained what I had seen and heard, and pointed out that there had recently been two burglaries at that block of flats. The reaction that I received could only be described as “a shrug of the shoulders and couldn’t care less”. The policeman more or less told me to forget about it. I appreciate that the circumstances may not have warranted an emergency response, but surely, if nothing else, a patrol car could have been alerted to pass by on its rounds and quickly check as to whether there had been a break-in.
So, while the idea of neighbourhood watches may be a good idea, this will only work if the police themselves are prepared to take reports from the public seriously.

Tim Drayton, Agios Athanasios, Limassol

HAVING READ your recent article comparing the provision of public transport from Stansted Airport and Heathrow (Sunday Mail, June 22) I thought I’d provide a few additional points that hopefully will be of interest to your readers.

As your article points out, the airport train station at Stansted is directly beneath the terminal building – this means a typical business passenger travelling with only hand luggage can exit the train and be at security within 2/3 minutes, a massive advantage when time is critical.

Also, the Stansted Express goes to the heart of the City of London business district, the destination for many business travellers, again, saving time and avoiding the need for changing trains.

The Stansted Express serves Tottenham Hale station in approximately 30 minutes. This allows passengers to connect with underground services across the tube network as well as providing quick and convenient access to many parts of north and east London, popular final destinations for many passengers coming to and from the UK.

Stansted currently has over 50 per cent of passengers using public transport to travel to and from the airport, the highest number of users for any major airport in the UK. This is a fantastic achievement and something we are very proud of.

It is also a reflection of the travel choices available and range of destinations served by trains and coaches from Stansted to London and across the UK.

Another significant benefit to airlines and passengers of using Stansted is our on-time departure performance.

Again, Stansted has the best record of any major airport in the south-east of England with 83 per cent of flights leaving on-time compared to 76 per cent at Heathrow.

This excellent performance is another time factor that should be beneficial to all passengers but especially those travelling on business
Since being acquired by M.A.G (Manchester Airports Group) last year, Stansted is undergoing a major £80 million transformation project to provide new facilities and improve the customer experience at the airport.

The new security area is already complete and we are in the middle of the next phase to redevelop the departure lounge to increase space and the number of shops, bars, restaurants and seats available to our passengers.

Mark Davison
Head of Media Relations, Stansted Airport