By Angelos Anastasiou

Former interior minister Dinos Michaelides’ trial in Athens was adjourned for the fifth time yesterday, following a tumultuous session with a generous dose of tension and objections that included the expulsion of a lawyer from the courtroom and the replacement of another by the court.

The trial, that will resume on Tuesday, July 15, started in May but has yet to see a single witness called to testify.

A few weeks ago, the Greek Bar Association warned its members not to take part in this trial, citing the presiding judge’s persistence to repeatedly adjourn the case.

As a result, despite attending the trial, the defendants’ lawyers refused to take part in the case, in compliance with the Bar Association’s directive. In response, the court took it upon itself to replace them with public defenders.

Once yesterday’s session got underway, the court-appointed defence lawyer, Yiorgos Sotiropoulos, said he was unable to dissent to his association’s decision, and resigned.

This caused the judge’s irritation and after a half-hour recess, she appointed legal aid counsellor Angelos Tsasis to represent Michalis Michaelides, Dinos’ son, also a defendant in the case.

Tsasis expressed reservations on his ability to study the mass of litigation in order to properly defend Michalis Michaelides.

The judge ruled that the four days to the new trial date are sufficient, and adjourned the trial until Tuesday.

Despite Dinos Michaelides also being appointed a new defence lawyer by the court – Elias Broumas – the former interior minister claimed that the lawyers “have never visited me in jail to discuss the case.”

Dinos and Michalis Michaelides are facing charges of receiving kickbacks and money laundering in relation to the purchase of TOR-M1 missiles by Greece during Akis Tsohatzopoulos’ term as Greek Defence minister.

The two defendants noted that they are the most eager for the trial to be over as “we go back to jail every time it gets adjourned, when everyone else goes home.” They also insist on being represented by the lawyers they chose in the first place.

Following Thursday’s adjournment, the defence lawyers tried to convince Tsasis to also decline to represent Michalis Michaelides.

Tsasis was annoyed by his colleagues’ pressure and told his client that it is in his best interest for the trial to be conducted.

“If you are innocent, as you claim, I will do everything to prove your innocence and get you out of jail as soon as possible,” he said.

Michaelides thanked Tsasis but repeated that he also wanted the trial to go ahead as soon as possible but with his own lawyers.

The prosecution charged that the defence’s stalling tactics are nothing new, and is often employed when a continuance is sought in order to have a new court convened.

“It is a familiar tactic employed to change the court’s seat,” one lawyer said.

Meanwhile, tension arose when lawyer Themis Sofos – representing Syrian arms dealer Fouad Al Zayad – addressed the court with a request to sit in on the trial on behalf of his client.

“But during the last session you also announced your abstention, therefore you are not part of the trial,” the judge replied. “Do you now rescind your abstention?”

“My presence here only serves to represent my client,” Sofos argued.

“Therefore you have altered your previous stance of abstaining?” the judge insisted.

This conversational pattern continued, much to the seat’s annoyance, and the judge finally ended it by saying “we can’t play word games here.” She called a new recess, and 20 minutes later ordered the bailiffs to expel Sofos from the courtroom.

By Madeline Chambers

Germany told the CIA station chief in Berlin to leave the country on Thursday in a dramatic display of anger from Chancellor Angela Merkel at the behaviour of a close ally after officials unearthed two suspected US spies.

The scandal has chilled relations with Washington to levels not seen since Merkel’s predecessor opposed the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. It follows allegations that Merkel herself, who grew up in Stasi-ridden East Germany, was among thousands of Germans whose mobile phones have been bugged by American agents.

“Spying on allies … is a waste of energy,” the chancellor said in her most pointed public remarks yet on the issue. “We have so many problems, we should focus on the important things.”

Senior conservative supporters denounced US “stupidity” and some Americans said spying on their friends had backfired.

“In the Cold War maybe there was general mistrust. Today we are living in the 21st century. Today there are completely new threats,” Merkel said in Berlin, once a key CIA listening post behind the Iron Curtain during the superpower duel with Moscow and now the reunited capital of Europe’s most powerful economy.

Her spokesman said the request for the top US intelligence official in the Berlin embassy to leave was made in response to questions raised in recent months on US intelligence activity in Germany and prosecutors’ investigations.

A US government source said the official – whom neither side named – was Berlin station chief for the CIA, the Central Intelligence Agency. A German source said the man would face possible forcible expulsion if he did not leave voluntarily.

Washington’s embassy and Merkel’s office sit a few hundred metres apart. They lie east and west of what was the Berlin Wall, for the removal of which many Germans still give great credit to their U.S. ally – deepening today’s sense of betrayal.

On Wednesday, Berlin said it had discovered a suspected US spy in the Defence Ministry. That came just days after a German foreign intelligence worker was arrested on suspicion of being a CIA informant and admitted passing documents to a US contact.

The scale of public outrage at these revelations has put pressure on Merkel to take action against the United States, an ally whose defence of West Germany in the Cold War long assured Americans a warmer welcome there than elsewhere in Europe.

However, there is a limit to what she can do and both sides stressed the need to continue to work closely together. They have done increasingly in recent years, on issues from Iran to Ukraine, as Germany shakes off its postwar reticence in foreign affairs and takes on a role more suited to its economic weight.

TRADE DEAL

Experts said that talks on a free trade deal between the European Union and United States, called the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), may be affected; Berlin may push harder on some aspects of the deal in areas such as data protection – long a major concern for Germans after the abuses of the Nazi Gestapo and East German Stasi secret police.

“But the idea that Merkel would somehow try to torpedo TTIP is not really likely,” said Germany expert Hans Kundnani at European Council on Foreign Relations in London.

John Kornblum, a former US ambassador to Germany who still lives in Berlin, said: “I believe the Germans are telling the Americans, ‘We want to continue close cooperation but you’ve pushed us too far and have forced us to react’.”

Merkel’s government poured scorn on the alleged espionage.

Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said the information the United States appeared to have obtained was “laughable”, contrasting that with the “disproportionate and serious political damage” the scandal had caused.

Merkel was “not amused”, Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said, adding: “This is so stupid, it can only make you weep.”

Tensions have risen since revelations last year stemming from documents leaked by Edward Snowden, a contractor with the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). Those caused Berlin to demand a mutual “no-spy deal” which Washington has resisted.

“Ever since the NSA disclosures broke last year, the issue of U.S. spying has been an extremely sensitive issue in Germany,” said Karen Donfried, president of the German Marshall Fund of the United States, which promotes US-European ties.

Some Americans asked whether the espionage activities were worth the bother: “I am not troubled that the United States conducts espionage, even against friendly states,” said one former senior U.S. intelligence official.

“I am troubled when we attempt espionage and do not do it well. We learn nothing and we embarrass a friend and ourselves.”

By Stefanos Evripidou

TURKEY has started to realise that the status quo on the island does not benefit it economically, militarily or politically, raising hope for a solution, US vice President Joe Biden told a Greek American audience.

Biden made the comment during a 40-minute speech, almost half of it dedicated to Cyprus, given to over 1,500 people at a Greek Orthodox Congress in Philadelphia.

According to Philly.com news, he spent a great deal of his time talking about the Cyprus problem, noting that he has been working with others for years to resolve this issue.

One of the “great disappointments” of his career was that after 40 years, which he described as a long, long time, there are still Turkish troops in Cyprus.

The vice president expressed cautious optimism that there could be a fair settlement in the near future, a compromise that would be beneficial to all sides.

He told the Philadelphia crowd about his trip to Cyprus in May, and his crystal clear statement on arrival that there is only one legitimate government on the island.

Cyprus News Agency (CNA) reported that Biden highlighted two main points on Cyprus. Turkish soldiers should not have stepped foot on the island without the request of the government, he said.

“And second, there is only one government on the island. That is my position, the position of the US and the position of all governments in the world, except one.”

In an effort to explain his cautious optimism on Cyprus, Biden listed three points.

First, under the leadership of the new Cypriot president Nicos Anastasiades, Cyprus has become a “genuine strategic partner of the US”.

The two countries have never worked so closely to increase trade and investments and deal with terrorism, he said, adding that Cyprus was a key link in the war against terrorism, helping to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and eliminate Syria’s chemical weapons.

Little Cyprus has taken on a disproportionate role compared to its size in a strategic relationship that is clearly in the US’ national interest, CNA quoted the vice president as saying.

A second point that makes him optimistic is the hydrocarbons discovered off Cyprus and Israel, and potentially off Greece and Lebanon, giving Cyprus a chance to play a leading role in bringing countries together and enhancing Europe’s energy security. The discoveries should change the rules of the game in the region if the countries meet and work together.

A third point is the increased awareness in the Turkish government on the benefits of a Cyprus solution, said Biden, who speaks regularly to Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, especially after the latest developments in Iraq.

The Turkish government is starting to understand, for practical reasons, that the status quo on the island is not conducive to them economically, militarily or politically, and that there is a significant potential benefit in a bizonal, bicommunal federation, said Biden.

He repeated the view often heard in Nicosia, that “Turkey is the key”.

Turkey should play a more constructive role in this regard, he said, adding this will be in its interest, considering that its security is under threat from the Russians in the Black Sea, from the collapse of Syria in the south, and Sunni militants (ISIL) in the east.

After speaking with Turkish Cypriot representatives, he got the impression there is a desire for a solution, that they’ve had enough of the status quo.

It is now understood that progress is in everyone’s interest, and that wasn’t the case before, he said.

The American vice president also spoke of his personal relationship with the Cypriot president and first lady, and the dinner they hosted at the Anastasiades’ residence in Limassol on his arrival, as well as the long friendly discussion the two men had on the verandah.

He described Anastasiades as a good and decent man.

POLICE seized a total of 23 computers during a Wednesday night raid in Limassol, in connection with a suspected online gambling ring.

A police report said that officers raided a store where it was suspected that people were gambling illegally.

Police said that they confiscated 23 computers that were used for access to the online gaming sites, as well as a sum of €340.

The owner of the store and the patrons present were questions at the Limassol police station and released without being charged.

AN ORGANISATION calling itself the Palestinian Community in Cyprus will stage a demonstration at 5pm on Saturday outside the Israeli Embassy in Nicosia “in solidarity with our brothers and sisters in Gaza and the West Bank and with the families of the recent victims”.

According to a press release, the demonstration is being organised in light of “the atrocities on the Palestinian people and the relentless bombings and killing of innocent people in Gaza”.

The organisers call on people to attend the demonstration outside the Israeli Embassy.

By George Psyllides

HEALTH authorities are pressing the finance ministry to authorise the hiring of 24 paramedic staff to man four regional ambulance stations and make the service more efficient, the Cyprus Mail has learned.

For years, successive administrations did nothing to improve the service. When they finally decided to train paramedics, the positions were frozen because of the economic crisis.

The hiring freeze in the public sector, including that of the 49 newly-trained paramedics, meant the ambulance stations earmarked for Klirou, Limassol town centre, Oroklini and Peyia cannot operate unless the finance ministry opens the positions.

The Cyprus Mail has learned that health authorities were pushing for the recruitment of 24 paramedics to staff the four centres.

Eight of them have since been hired after the same number of ambulance drivers retired.

However, opening the four stations does not appear to be in the government’s immediate priorities.

By Evie Andreou

A MASTER plan which is hoped will put an end to a 25-year dispute over the fate of the Akamas peninsula, will be presented at the Presidential Palace on Friday by the coordinating committee comprising the Akamas landowners and the local community councils.

The coordinating committee will meet with Under-secretary to the President Constantinos Petrides to discuss the final stage of the project.

In the proposal, the committee suggests the creation of a strategic plan for the development of sustainable ecotourism for the whole Akamas Peninsula, incorporated within a management plan which will protect the Akamas forest and biodiversity, with the formation at the same time of a compensation and land exchange committee.

“If the government adopts these steps it will be the right path that will lead to the solution of a 25-year-old problem,” the committee said in an announcement.

The coordinating committee will also express its concerns over the one-sided activity which took place after the project was delivered to the Agriculture ministry.

It claims that the Environment department has not consulted with the communities and affected landowners of the area after the project was prepared and that officials only considered the opinions of the various departments of Agriculture and Interior, as well as the senior officer responsible for the Akamas plan.

“If this information is correct, it will be an unprecedented scandal within the Agriculture ministry,” the committee said.

In April, residents and landowners of the region agreed to approve the EU Natura 2000 environmental protection programme.

Akamas was designated a protected natural habitat within the Natura 2000 network, much to the displeasure of those residents who owned land within the territory.

In the last 25 years, various administrations have repeatedly presented the land owners with expropriation proposals but the owners have rejected them every time.

By Natalia Zinets and Maria Tsvetkova

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko vowed to “find and destroy” pro-Russian rebels who killed 23 servicemen and wounded nearly 100 in a missile attack on Friday.

Poroshenko issued his angry statement following an emergency meeting of his security chiefs called in response to the early morning strike by Russian-made Grad missiles on an army motorised brigade near the border with Russia.

The attack, which came as government forces seemed to be prevailing in the three-month conflict, appeared to be the deadliest on government troops since the Ukrainian military ended a unilateral ceasefire on June 30.

“All those who used the Grad against the Armed Forces of Ukraine will be found and destroyed,” Poroshenko said in a statement on his website.

“For every soldier’s life, the militants will pay with scores and hundreds of their own. Not a single terrorist will avoid responsibility; each will get what they deserve,” he said.

The pro-Russian separatists launched a volley of Grad missiles at 4:30 a.m. on the border post at Zelenopillya, in Ukraine’s easternmost Luhansk region, military sources said.

Ukraine’s Defence Ministry said 19 servicemen were killed and the border guard service said four of its number also died. Military spokesman Vladyslav Seleznyov said on his Facebook page 93 were injured in the Grad attack.

Authorities had earlier put the death toll at up to 30 but this was later scaled down to 23.

Kiev blames Moscow for fanning the violence and allowing fighters and high-powered weaponry to cross the frontier from Russia to Ukraine.

The attack was a big setback for the government which scored a notable victory last weekend by pushing rebels out of their stronghold in Slaviansk and forcing them back to the industrial city of Donetsk, where they have dug in.

Separatists have been battling government forces for three months since they set up ‘people’s republics’ in the Russian-speaking east of the country and said they want to join Russia.

Poroshenko’s government has threatened a “nasty surprise” to drive rebels out of Donetsk, the region’s industrial hub with a population of 900,000, while pledging to limit civilian casualties.

A WAY OUT

In Donetsk’s main railway station, people said they had been waiting in line for two hours to buy tickets to flee the city, which they feared would suffer the same destruction as Slaviansk did during fighting.

Separatist leader Alexander Borodai told journalists on Thursday 70,000 residents had already left the city.

“We decided yesterday to leave the city and immediately got ready,” said Nadezhda Avramenko, 55, a housewife sitting on the train platform with her family.

Standing in line for tickets, Irina, 55, a kindergarten teacher, said she was leaving with her family

“We’re going to Crimea. We’ll return if the Donetsk People’s Republic holds out and if the monstrous Ukrainians come, then there will be no return. How can you live with them if they’re killing people,” she said.

Elsewhere in the Luhansk region, four servicemen were killed when their armoured personnel vehicle detonated a mine, said military spokesman Andriy Lysenko on Friday, while another soldier was killed in the town of Karlovka in Donetsk province.

Separately, at least five miners died and another five were injured when their bus came under fire from rebels, Lysenko said.

The shelling of the bus forced energy and coal company DTEK, which employed the miners, to suspend operations at four mines in the economically depressed industrial province of Luhansk, Interfax news agency quoted the company as saying.

DIPLOMACY

The missile attack took the gloss off the government’s Slaviansk victory and seemed likely to add a new sense of urgency to diplomatic attempts to end the worst crisis between Russia and the West since the Cold War.

With an eye to Donetsk which government forces hope to recapture, German Chancellor Angela Merkel urged Poroshenko by telephone on Thursday to use a sense of proportion in actions against separatists and to protect civilians.

A statement said both sides agreed that a meeting was needed of the ‘contact group’ which had met during Poroshenko’s ten-day ceasefire to prepare the way for peace talks.

The chance for peace talks withered after Poroshenko called off the ceasefire on June 30 in the face of rising domestic anger over numerous ceasefire violations by the rebels.

By George Psyllides
THE Paphos district court on Friday ordered a plaintiff in a bank bond case against former Laiki Bank strongman Andreas Vgenopoulos to provide more details, describing as insufficient the information provided so far.
Vgenopoulos and former Laiki CEO Efthimios Bouloutas have been sued by a Paphos investor who accused the now defunct bank’s brass of miss-selling the bonds and deceiving him.
The pair’s defence lawyers argued that the details provided by the plaintiff’s lawyer were insufficient for them to mount a defence, a position upheld by the court in an interim decision issued yesterday.
The court said it will hear the case from October 7 to 16.
A number of bondholders in the island’s major banks claim they were duped into investing high-yield bonds without being informed of the risks, and some have sued the banks because they were allegedly not properly informed of the risks.
Laiki stopped paying interest on the bonds after incurring losses from a Greek sovereign debt write-down in 2011. The bonds offered an attractive return of 7.0 per cent in some cases.
The total amount placed in securities across Cyprus’ banks is said to be about €1.4bn.
It was decided to shut down Laiki as part of the terms of the island’s €10bn bailout.

By George Psyllides
STATE primary school teachers criticised Finance minister Harris Georgiades on Friday over the government’s intention to overhaul the way pay rises were calculated in the public sector.
True to form, their union, POED, described the comments as “unacceptable, inopportune and provocative,” suggesting that public sector workers were shouldering a significant and disproportionate burden of the economic downturn.
“Possibly attempting to mislead the public opinion, but also sustaining the fake yet deliberate ‘clash’ between workers in the private and public sectors, serves ulterior plans and interest, in our view,” POED said.
The union suggested that it would have been more useful if the minister announced measures to stamp out tax evasion and the real causes that led the country into the mire.
On Thursday, Georgiades said the government had no intention of returning to the previous system of automatic wage hikes, incremental increases and Cost of Living Allowance (CoLA) adjustments.
He said the government was working on a way in which wages and their increases will be assigned in a manner that adhered much more to the real performance of the economy.
Georgiades warned that going back to the old system would land Cyprus in the rut again in no time.
Main opposition party AKEL claimed that Georgiades’ comments were heralding further cuts in wages after the end of the adjustment programme.
“Through such actions, the government reconfirmed the unprecedented authoritarianism that distinguishes them in taking and unilaterally imposing serious decisions without any dialogue at all,” party spokesman Giorgos Loukaides said.

By Evie Andreou
A MASTER plan for Akamas cannot be implemented unless the area’s landowners and local community councils are involved in the decision making process, they declared during a meeting at the Presidential Palace yesterday.
The community leaders of Inia, Drousheia, Kathikas, Arodes and Neo Chorio, who met with Under-secretary to the President Constantinos Petrides to discuss the final stage of the management plan, did not accept the draft that has been prepared and expressed their dismay at the fact that they haven’t been included in the decision making process.
“The plan, which has been coming and going since 1989, we were told would be released in January and now we are told it is being scrutinised by environment experts,” Neo Chorio community leader Andreas Christodoulou told the Cyprus Mail.
The joint committee asked Petrides for the plan to be submitted to the communities to study and propose their suggestions.
“We hope that the plan will be given to us this month. All the communities have experts who will offer their advice. We, too, know what the environment is all about and what Akamas is,” Christodoulou said.
The coordinating committee has used the crisis once more to press the cash-strapped state for more development by proposing sustainable ecologic development and a mild building development. They had proposed the same last August.
“Since the government cannot pay us for our land, and since they cannot give us land elsewhere, we ask that we are allowed an 8 to 10 per cent building coefficient that will allow some development in the area,” Christodoulou said.
The preparation of the master plan cannot be criticised before the procedures are over, said the Agriculture ministry’s Environment Department, following the committee’s allegations of their exclusion from the process.
“The (Akamas) coordinating committee’s reference to a scandal and to the absence of information and consultations with communities are not true, since consultations with them and with the public were and are scheduled to take place before its adoption,” the Department said, adding that the main goal is the formation of a plan to be accepted by the communities.
“The plan will also be presented to the Akamas ministerial committee, appointed by the Cabinet,” the announcement said.
Discussions and negotiations for the status of Akamas have been underway for 25 years.
Landowners and local residents have long argued that it is unfair not to allow them to develop what has become prime real estate, while conservationists counter that Akamas is one of the last truly beautiful nature spots in the government-controlled areas which is already under threat by the gradual encroachment of development, with the tolerance of the authorities.
Akamas is included in NATURA 2000, an EU-wide network of nature protection areas established under the 1992 Habitats Directive as an EU obligation under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity.

By Constantinos Psillides
NICOSIA mayor Constantinos Yiorkadjis and his newly elected Turkish Cypriot counterpart in the north Mehmet Harmanci met for the first time on Friday, in an attempt to compile a list of priorities the two municipalities can work together to resolve.
Speaking to the press, Yiorkadjis said that the two sides face a number of problems and that he met with Harmanci, who was elected on June 29, in an attempt to tackle these issues together.
“This is our first meeting. We thought it was best we get to know each other,” Yiorkadjis remarked.
The Nicosia mayor said that both officials will set down their priorities and look into ways of solving problems that affect the daily lives of people on both sides.
Harmanci, on his part, also pointed out the fact that this is the first meeting between the two and expressed his willingness to work with Yiorkadjis to improve the quality of life and public services withing both communities.
“This meeting is a good start for a future possible collaboration,” said Harmanci, whose election was widely unexpected and ran as the dark horse in the municipal race last month.
Both mayors are relatively young. Harmanci is 37 years old, while Yiorkadjis is 46.

THE remains of a Greek Cypriot who had been missing since the 1974 Turkish invasion will be buried at his village in the occupied north of island, it was announced yesterday.
This will be the first time since the Turkish invasion that a funeral will be held in the north of a missing Greek Cypriot.
Yiannakis Liasi will be buried in Ayia Triada on the Karpas peninsula, the village where his parents Savvas and Maroulla still live.
The 21-year-old soldier was last seen on August 11, 1974. Liasi, a first-year economics student at the University of Athens, was serving as a reservist at the time with the 361 Infantry Battalion.
He was found in a mass grave with four others in Klepini, near Kyrenia, in March 2010.
His sister, Toula, who left Ayia Triada in August 1975 and has been living in Holland for the past 34 years, said it would be the biggest honour for him to be buried at the place where he was born and raised.

HOTELIERS were grumbling on Friday because parliament failed to change the immovable property tax (IPT), effectively leaving it the same as last year when hotels paid five times higher rates, they claimed.
In a written statement, the hotel association (PASYXE) expressed deep disappointment over the fact.
“Despite assurances given last year that the specific way of taxing real estate would only be in effect for a year, parliament on Thursday gave the green light to keep the same taxation,” PASYXE said.
The association suggested that the government was reverting to the era of milking the cash cow, which in recent years has become emaciated.
PASYXE sought to clarify that it had never asked for hotels to be exempted from IPT, but it was seeking a more rational rate of taxation.
“The hotel industry is prepared to pay an increased IPT but within a logical framework that would allow its growth and not its strangulation by raising it fivefold,” the association said.
Property owners will pay this year’s IPT on rates based on 1980 values after disagreements over the updated rates tabled by the government.
Parties felt that the new rates placed the burden on the owners of mid-value properties and decided to stick to the values used last year.

By Evie Andreou
POSTAL charges will go up by nearly a quarter next month, but they still remain still among the cheapest in Europe, chief postal superintendent Sofronis Tsiartas said yesterday.
The increase will come into effect on August 1, which Tsiartas said was deemed necessary by the Commissioner for the Regulation of Electronic Communications and Post, who regulates the rates and profit levels of the Postal Services.
“It is important that we have a reasonable profit margin so that the service can remain viable,” Tsiartas said, adding that postal charges have been at the same level since 2002.
The new charges will be announced next week in the government gazette.
“There will be a 20 per cent rise in internal parcel deliveries and 25 per cent for deliveries abroad,” Tsiartas said.
The superintendent also said that the increase in prices is inversely proportional to the decrease in parcel deliveries.
“A reduction in parcel deliveries affect our costs. When the demand drops the costs rise and when demand is increased, costs fall,” Tsiartas said.
He added that except from technological improvements which have led to the decrease of traditional parcel correspondence and which affected postal authorities worldwide, the closing down of many businesses that used Cyprus Post for their correspondence and advertising material is another reason that contributed greatly to the authority’s lower revenues.

By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Ori Lewis
Israel said on Friday it would not bow to international pressure to end air strikes in Gaza that officials there said had killed almost 100 Palestinians, despite an offer by US President Barack Obama to help negotiate a ceasefire with militants.
Asked if Israel might move from the mostly aerial attacks of the past four days into a ground war in Gaza to stop militant rocket fire, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu replied, “we are weighing all possibilities and preparing for all possibilities.”
“No international pressure will prevent us from acting with all power,” he told reporters in Tel Aviv a day after a telephone conversation with Obama about the worst flare-up in Israeli-Palestinian violence in almost two years.
On Friday Washington affirmed Israel’s right to defend itself in a statement from the Pentagon. But Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel told Israeli Defence Minister Moshe Ya’alon he was concerned “about the risk of further escalation and emphasized the need for all sides to do everything they can to protect civilian lives and restore calm.”
A rocket caused the first serious Israeli casualty – one of eight people hurt when a fuel tanker was hit at a service station in Ashdod, 30 km (20 miles) north of Gaza, and Palestinian militants warned international airlines they would fire rockets at Tel Aviv’s main airport.
Medical officials in Gaza said at least 75 civilians, including 23 children, were among at least 99 people killed in the aerial bombardments which Israel began on Tuesday. They included 12 killed on Friday.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas urged the United Nations Security Council to order an immediate truce.
But Israel said it was determined to end cross-border rocket attacks that intensified last month after its forces arrested hundreds of activists from the Islamist Hamas movement in the occupied West Bankfollowing the abduction there of three Jewish teenagers who were later found killed. A Palestinian youth was killed in Jerusalem in a suspected Israeli revenge attack.
Israel’s campaign “will continue until we are certain that quiet returns to Israeli citizens”, Netanyahu said.Israel had attacked more than 1,000 targets in Gaza and there were “more to go.”
Israel’s military commander, Lieutenant-General Benny Gantz, said his forces were ready to act as needed – an indication of a readiness to send in tanks and other ground troops, as Israel last did for two weeks in early 2009.
“We are in the midst of an assault and we are prepared to expand it as much as is required, to wherever is required, with whatever force will be required and for as long as will be required,” Gantz told reporters.
Western-backed Abbas, who is based in the West Bank and agreed a power-sharing deal with Gaza’s dominant Hamas in April after years of feuding, called for international help: “The Palestinian leadership urges the Security Council to quickly issue a clear condemnation of this Israeli aggression and impose a commitment of a mutual ceasefire immediately,” he said.
After the failure of the latest US-brokered peace talks with Israel, Abbas’s accord with Hamas angered Israel.
The rocket salvoes by the hardline movement and its allies, some striking more than 100 km (60 miles) from Gaza, have killed no one so far, due in part to interception by Israel’s partly-US funded Iron Dome aerial defence system.
But racing for shelter had become a routine for hundreds of thousands of Israelis and their leaders have hinted they could order troops into the Gaza Strip, a 40-km sliver of coastline that is home to nearly two million people. Some 20,000 reservists have already been mobilised, the army says.
Hamas’s armed wing said it would fire rockets at Tel Aviv’s Ben-Gurion international airport and warned airlines not to fly to Israel’s main gateway to the world.
The airport has been fully operational since the Israeli offensive began and international airlines have continued to fly in, with no reports of rockets from Gaza – largely inaccurate projectiles – landing anywhere near the facility, inland of the coastal metropolis. It is within an area covered by Iron Dome.
The Israeli military said it launched fresh naval and air strikes early on Friday on Gaza, giving no further details.
An air strike on a house in the city of Gaza killed a man described by Palestinian officials as a doctor and pharmacist. Medics and residents said an aircraft also bombed a three-storey house in the southern town of Rafah, killing five people.
Later a four-year-old boy killed when a neighbour’s house was targeted by an Israeli raid, a Palestinian hospital official said. Two other people aged 70 and 80 were killed in a missile strike elsewhere in Gaza, the Palestinian Heath Ministry said.
Homes, many belonging to militants, have been targeted frequently in attacks that have sent Palestinian families living nearby running into the streets in panic. Explosions echo constantly across the densely populated territory.
The Palestinian Interior Ministry in Gaza said an Israeli strike targeted the home of a senior Islamic Jihadleader after darkness fell, at a moment when Israel reported heavy rocket barrages on its southern cities.
There were no reports of any casualties in these raids.
White streaks arcing into a blue sky, ending abruptly in flashes and dark puffs of smoke marked what the military said was the interception of three rockets over Tel Aviv.
LEBANESE ROCKETS
Fire was also exchanged across Israel’s northern border. Lebanese security sources said two rockets were fired into northern Israel on Friday but they did not know who had fired them. Israel responded with artillery fire. Palestinian groups in Lebanon have often fired rockets into Israel in the past.
Lebanese security forces arrested a Lebanese man suspected of firing the rockets with two Palestinians, the national news agency said. The Israeli military said they caused no damage.
Palestinians said Israeli tanks fired shells east of Rafah, ships shelled a security compound in the city of Gaza and aircraft bombed positions near the Egyptian and Israeli borders.
Netanyahu told Israelis in a televised statement on Thursday: “So far the battle is progressing as planned, but we can expect further stages in future. Up to now, we have hit Hamas and the terror organisations hard and as the battle continues we will increase strikes at them.”
The offensive is the deadliest since November 2012, when around 180 Palestinians and six Israelis were killed during an Israeli air campaign to punish Hamas for missile attacks. That conflict was eventually halted with mediation from Egypt, which was then governed by Hamas’s Muslim Brotherhoodallies.
But Egypt, now ruled by the Brotherhood’s enemies, is today locked in a feud with Hamas over the group’s alleged support for militants in Egypt’s Sinai desert – something Hamas denies. Cairo said on Friday its “intensive efforts” with all sides to end the warfare has met only “intransigence and stubbornness”.
Izzat El-Risheq, a Hamas official told Arab television Al-Hadath “there are efforts for a ceasefire,” but demanded Israel stop its offensive before any deal could be reached.
If Israel launches a ground invasion of Gaza, it would be the first since a three-week war in the winter of 2008-09, when some 1,400 Palestinians and 13 Israelis were killed.
The Israeli military said some 550 projectiles have been fired at Israel since Tuesday and that it had targeted some 210 sites in the Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours, among them “long-range rocket launchers, Hamas leadership facilities and terror and smuggling tunnels”.
An anti-tank rocket fired near the Gaza border wounded two Israeli soldiers on Friday, and Israel said it had targeted seven Hamas militants accused of involvement in rocket attacks.

By Constantinos Psillides
The crisis following the Mari naval base blast was unprecedented and dealing with its aftermath has made us wiser, Yiorgos Shammas, head of the Cyprus Electricity Regulating Authority (CERA) said yesterday.
The tragedy that rocked the nation, caused a power blackout and brought the economy to its knees, occurred very early in the morning of July 11, 2011 when 100 munitions containers exploded, killing seven sailors and six firemen who were trying to put out the fires.
“There was no literature on dealing with such a disaster. It was like the station had been bombed, that was our impression. Therefore there is no manual telling us what to do. It was an urgent situation demanding urgent decisions, new thinking and team work,” Shammas said in an interview he gave to the Cyprus News Agency.
He added that the first images from his visit to the destroyed Vassiliko power station next to the Mari base caused “shock and sorrow.”
Shammas argued that the only reason Cyprus pulled through that ordeal was that the shortfall was small, making the situation much more manageable.
He recalled that his first action was to notify then Commerce minister Antonis Paschalidis to issue a decree mandating CERA to order the electricity authority (EAC) to rent mobile generators to face the power shortfall. A crisis management unit was set up, tasked with monitoring the situation daily.
“Cyprus is in a state of emergency,” read the three-page letter Shammas had sent to Pascsalidis.
The generators were installed and working by August 15 leading to the termination of the rolling blackouts.
Competent EU authorities were also notified of the disaster.
Shammas noted that a significant decision was to exempt essential services, hospitals as well as tourist installations from rolling power cuts. “I believe that decision saved our economy. If tourist units had been affected we would have had cancellations of holiday reservations,” he added.
Furthermore, Shammas said that CERA introduced technical novelties such as “marginal adequacy,” as it decided to rent generators of a capacity of only 165 MW instead of covering the whole 400MW-gap that emerged from the blast. “We were trying to limit the load to the taxpayer,” he said.
The blast and the consequent destruction of the island’s main power station resulted in a nearly 7 per cent hike of the electricity bill, which was abolished in September 2013.
The Vassilikos station was partially restored in August 2013.
Shammas also noted that in dealing with the crisis, CERA ignored “imaginative” – as he called them – solutions, like tearing down the power-plant and installing photovoltaics instead.
“Every proposal we heard was unattainable and would have had grave implications to the country’s economy, so we closed our ears to all of those proposals,” he explained.
Shammas concluded that the crisis made us wiser and that the Commerce ministry is working on a legal framework regarding risk assessment studies for areas where such facilities are located.

TWO 17-year-old boys were killed in two separate road accidents in the Nicosia district on Friday night and early Saturday morning.
The first accident took place shortly after 10 pm Friday, when a car driven by a 35-year-old man on Archbishop Makarios avenue in Klirou, Nicosia, entered the opposite driving lane and crashed head on with a motorbike driven by 17-year-old Haritos Aristodemou, from Kalo Chorio Orinis village.
The 17-year-old was rushed to Nicosia General Hospital, where he died shortly after midnight.
In a second accident, at around 4 am Saturday a car driven by an 18-year-old, with two other boys as passengers, 18 and 17, crashed into a car driven by a 21-year-old from Nicosia at the intersection between Tseriou with Strovolou avenues.
The crash killed 17-year-old Stylianos Tsatsos, and the two drivers and one other passenger had to be pulled out of the wrecked cars by the fire brigade and rushed to Nicosia General, where they are in serious condition.
Police urge anyone with information about the accident to contact either Nicosia Traffic police or their nearest police station, or call the citizens’ communication number 1460.

By Angelos Anastasiou
THE FIRST ever funeral of a Greek Cypriot missing person to take place in the Turkish-occupied areas was held on Saturday in Ayia Triada, Yialousa, and attended by family, friends and government officials.
Army reservist Yiannakis Savva Liasis,21, was killed during the Turkish invasion in August 1974, but was listed as missing when his body was never found.
His remains were found in March 2010 in a mass grave in Klepini along with four other bodies, and his identity was confirmed via DNA testing in May. He was last seen on August 11, 1974 by his parents, who since the invasion have become part of the enclaved community in their home village of Ayia Triada. It was their wish that their son be buried in the village cemetery.
The government was represented at the funeral by the head of the president’s office, Panayiotis Antoniou, who gave a eulogy.
“After an unacceptable delay of 40 years, we direct our final farewell to Yiannakis Liasis, a brilliant and virtuous young man with passion and dreams for himself, his family and his homeland,” Antoniou told a congregation that included Liasis’ parents, Savvas and Maroulla Liasis, and his sister, Toula.
Liasis’ remains were discovered as part of the ongoing investigations carried out by the Committee for the Missing Persons (CMP), comprising representatives of the two communities in Cyprus and the United Nations’ Secretary General and aiming to ascertain the fate of all persons missing since 1974.
“The aim is to finally end this humanitarian problem that continues to hurt many people, Greek and Turkish Cypriots alike, especially relatives who demand and are entitled to answers with regard to the fate of their loved ones and have their funerals according to their religion and sacred traditions,” Antoniou said.
According to Antoniou, 331 out of 1619 Greek Cypriot missing persons have been identified, in addition to 64 from the special category of fallen persons. A further nine of 43 missing since the 1963-64 intercommunal strife, were identified, making a total of 404 Greek Cypriots.
With regard to Turkish Cypriot missing persons, the remains of 125 out of 502 cases submitted to the CMP were identified. Of the total number, 229 relate to the 1963-64 period and 273 to the 1974 period. An additional 36 cases were later submitted, of which two relate to 1974.
“As evidenced by the numbers, significant progress has been made on the issue of missing persons over the last few years, and yet the body of outstanding work is much greater,” Antoniou said.
He said there is much work to be done and spoke of the urgency of the matter, as many parents and family members are now elderly or pass away without having knowing what became of their loved ones.
The matter, he said, has been raised in meetings between the leaders of the island’s two communities in the hope that their decisions will facilitate and accelerate the work of the CMP, regardless of how the negotiations are progressing.
President Nicos Anastasiades and Turkish Cypriot leader Dervis Eroglu agreed at a meeting they had on July 7 to jointly visit the anthropological laboratory of the Committee on Missing Persons on July 24, prior to their meeting on the same day.
“On behalf of President Nikos Anastasiades and his government, I extend my warmest condolences to Yiannakis Liasis’ parents, Savvas and Maroulla, as well as his sister Toula,” he said. “Their pain in immense, but I hope it is softened by the fact that Yiannakis will rest in his beloved land, where he was born and raised with all the values and principles his family and his school gave him, here in our beloved Karpasia.”
Liasi was born on May 5, 1953 and attended the Yialousa high school. In 1974 he was a freshman at the Economics Department at Athens University. The last time his family saw him was August 11, when he told them that he was heading for the village of Ayios Epiktitos.
Toula, who has been living in Holland for the last 34 years and works as an artist and art teacher, said last week that with her brother’s burial her family would finally find peace. “It’s a great honour for him, to be buried in his village,” she said.
“It has been 40 years since my brother went missing. Now he is back, back where he belongs, where he spent his childhood years, laughing, playing, not having a care in the world. This is the only place where he could rest. The only place where one can find eternal peace is his home.”

By Evie Andreou
HALA Sultan mosque in Larnaca, one of the holiest shrines of the Islamic world with historical ties to Prophet Mohammed’s aunt, has been granted a Certificate of Excellence by Internet travel site TripAdvisor.
The Antiquities department said that the award is the recognition of the government efforts which in tough economic conditions continues to upgrade popular visitor sites and promotes the island’s rich cultural heritage.
The award is granted to hospitality enterprises that consistently achieve outstanding traveller reviews on TripAdvisor.
“The Certificate is a real source of pride for hospitality professionals because it’s determined by traveller reviews,” said the award’s board in a congratulatory message to this year’s winners.
To qualify for a Certificate of Excellence, a hospitality business must maintain an overall TripAdvisor rating of at least four out of five, have a minimum number of reviews and to have been listed on the wesbite for at least twelve months.
Hala Sultan mosque is considered to be the third holiest place for Muslims. It was built around the tomb of Umm Haram, Prophet Mohammed’s wet nurse who fell off her horse and died on the same spot during the first Arab raids in Cyprus between 647 and 649AD.
The mosque was built gradually in 1787 during the Ottoman rule and took its final form in 1816.
In their reviews, visitors appreciated the mosque’s history, the view to the nearby Salt Lake and the fact that it is in a peaceful and serene setting.