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South Africa football captain Meyiwa killed by intruders

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South Africa football captain Senzo Meyiwa was shot dead by intruders during a robbery

By Mark Gleeson

South Africa football captain Senzo Meyiwa was shot dead by intruders when trying to protect his girlfriend during a robbery at her home near Johannesburg, officials said on Monday.

The 27-year-old Orlando Pirates goalkeeper died on Sunday after suffering a single shot through the chest at the home of girlfriend Kelly Khumalo, a local actress and singer, in the township of Vosloorus.

“Two guys entered the house and demanded cellphones, money and other valuables,” provincial Community Safety official Sizakele Nkosi-Malubane told reporters at the scene.

“Senzo tried to protect Kelly because one of the men had a gun pointed towards her.”

“We can confirm that Pirates keeper Senzo Meyiwa has been shot and sadly declared dead on arrival at hospital,” the South African Police Services said on its Twitter feed.

“We must emphasize break of protocol… We know there are upset and hurt pple (people) at the house where the incident occurred and at hospital. Calm please.

“We can assure all South Africans that we will do all we can to bring Meyiwa’s killers to book,” the police said in a further tweet, offering a reward of R150,000 ($13,700).

The 27-year-old captained South Africa in their last four matches in the African Nations Cup qualifiers without conceding a goal and played on Saturday when his club advanced to the semi-finals of the South African League Cup.

“This is a sad loss whichever way you look at it – to Senzo’s family, his extended family, Orlando Pirates and to the nation,” Pirates chairman Irvin Khoza said in a statement.

News of the shooting prompted widespread sympathy on social media and condemnation of South Africa’s rampant gun violence.
“How do you kill someone for a cellphone?” tweeted national team mate Tsepo Masilela.

Belgian-based goalkeeper Darren Keet, who had been Meyiwa’s understudy over the last four internationals, tweeted: “When does it STOP South Africa?”

Meyiwa’s death follows that of another prominent South African sportsman, former world 800 metres champion Mbulaeni Mulaudzi, killed in a car accident on Friday.

Violent gun crime in South Africa has been highlighted by the trial of Paralympic athlete Oscar Pistorius, who was given a five-year jail sentence for culpable homicide after shooting dead his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp.

More than 17,000 people were murdered in South Africa between April 2013 and March 2014, an increase of about 800 over the previous year, according to police figures.

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Acropol cinema burned to the ground

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By Constantinos Psillides

The Acropol cinema in Nicosia was burned to the ground on Sunday, with the fire department laying the blame on kids seen regularly around the place.

According to the fire department, the fire was first spotted at around 11pm on Saturday night. Five fire department trucks were dispatched to deal with it, finally putting it out in the early hours of Sunday.

The cinema was completely destroyed.

Residents told authorities that the cinema was often visited by kids, who lit bonfires and threw crackers into the fire. According to the police report, the abandoned cinema was also frequented by drug users.

Other residents told CyBC that the people hanging around at Acropol were often drunk and disorderly. “We lodged complaints with the police multiple times but nobody did anything about it,” said a resident.

The once popular outdoor venue has been abandoned for years and was left to the elements. According to the owner, it was about to be demolished. The cinema’s entrance door was broken down so it was open to anyone.

Fire department officials believe that the fire was caused by an out of control bonfire.

According to CyBC, Acropol was partly damaged by a fire two months ago.

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Pro-West parties secure big win in Ukraine election – partial vote count

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Members of a local electoral commission empty a ballot box at a polling station after voting day in Kiev

By Pavel Polityuk and Richard Balmforth

Pro-Europe parties secured a big win in an election in Ukraine, a partial vote count showed on Monday, with President Petro Poroshenko hailing people’s support for his plan to end a separatist war and pursue democratic reforms sought by the West.

Early figures from the vote count showed that Poroshenko’s bloc and the party of his ally, Prime Minister Arseny Yatseniuk, were both taking over 21 per cent of the votes cast from a field of 29 competing parties.

Addressing Ukrainians two hours after polling ended on Sunday night, he thanked voters for backing a “democratic, reformist, pro-Ukrainian and pro-European majority”.

“The majority of voters were in favour of the political forces that support the president’s peace plan and seek a political solution to the situation in the Donbass,” Poroshenko said, referring to the region of the industrialised east where government forces have been fighting separatist rebels.

With more than a quarter of the vote counted, the central election commission gave the People’s Front of Yatseniuk a vote share of 21.67 per cent fractionally ahead of Poroshenko’s bloc which was on 21.63 percent.

An earlier partial count and exit polls had put Poroshenko’s grouping slightly in the lead.

The result showed Poroshenko, a 49-year-old confectionery magnate, was now likely to continue working in close tandem with Yatseniuk, with the latter possibly staying on as prime minister to handle sensitive talks with the West on aid for the war-shattered economy.

Though a hawk in dealings with Russia, Yatseniuk is liked in the West for his commitment to deep reforms and astute stewardship of the economy which has been wrecked by the separatist conflict in the eastern regions.

The figures, which roughly confirmed earlier exit polls, put another pro-Europe party from western Ukraine in third place.

Poroshenko said the People’s Front was the “main partner” in any parliamentary coalition and talks to form the majority could begin on Monday. He wanted talks to be wrapped up quickly to form Ukraine’s “best government”.

But a surprise was the strong performance registered by allies of ousted president Viktor Yanukovich. The Opposition Bloc of ex-Fuel Minister Yuriy Boiko was on 9.62 per cent, easily enough to put the party into parliament, according to the latest available figures from the count.

Though a fuller picture will not take shape for hours, it was clear a pro-Western assembly was emerging from the first parliamentary election since Yanukovich’s overthrow by street protests in February.

The count gave a partial read-out only of party voting for 225 of the 450 seats in parliament. Results from voting for single constituency seats will be known only in a few days time.

The election completed attempts by Poroshenko and his allies to restore normalcy to the sprawling country of 46 million after a year of turmoil and violence.

The overthrow of Yanukovich by “Euromaidan” street protests, which broke out when he ditched a deal to take Ukraine closer to Europe and out of the Russian orbit, led to Russia denouncing a “fascist” coup and annexing Ukraine’s Crimea.

Moscow went on to back separatist rebellions in Ukraine’s industrialised east which have killed more than 3,700 people.

Despite the surprise showing of Boiko’s Opposition Bloc, other traditional allies of Russia such as the communists flopped and the make-up of the future pro-Europe assembly seemed likely to spell future tensions with Moscow with which Ukraine is also locked in a dispute over gas prices.

It will be the first time the communists have been out of parliament since Ukraine gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.

FORGING A COALITION

“We can say today that a third of voters support the president’s course for carrying out reforms for entering the European Union,” said Yuriy Lutsenko, the leader of the Poroshenko Bloc.

With the pro-Europe party Selfhelp in third place on 10.56 percent, according to the early count figures, Poroshenko should be able to forge a coalition to move Ukraine towards the European mainstream.

Other parties which seemed likely to enter parliament on the basis of the exit poll included the Radical Party of populist Oleh Lyashko. The Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party of former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko performed worse than many had expected, but with almost 6 percent from the partial count was above the bar required to enter parliament.

The outcome suggested many war veterans and “Euromaidan” activists enlisted as candidates will enter parliament, giving it a strong patriotic and nationalist flavour.

Boiko, whose party has criticised Poroshenko’s policies in the east and campaigned in Yanukovich’s power bases there, said on Sunday night he would work for the “removal of the current authorities”.

After battlefield losses, Poroshenko has said he would resolve the conflict in the east only by political negotiations.

Voting did not take place on Sunday in areas held by the rebels or in Crimea. In eastern regions controlled by the army, armed soldiers guarded polling stations under Ukraine’s flag.

Separatist rebels entrenched in the big eastern cities of Donetsk and Luhansk said they were ignoring the Ukrainian election and still planned to go ahead with a rival vote on Nov. 2 to further their calls for independence.

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Armed robbers take €77,500 from Limassol house

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Cash and jewellery worth €87,000 were reported stolen in an armed robbery from a house in Pyrgos in Limassol on Sunday.
According to police reports, the owner of the house, a 49-year-old woman from China, reported that three men with guns broke into her house at around 7.30pm, immobilised her and a 33-year-old relative and took €77,400 and $9,300 in cash from a safe.
They also reportedly stole €800 from another room of the house and a diamond ring worth €5,000.
The woman reported that the men, who tied her and her relative up with a duct tape, had their faces covered with masks and were approximately 1.65cm, 1.70cm and 1.80cm tall.
Limassol CID is investigating the case.

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US Ebola nurse ‘plans legal action’

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A man wearing PPE as a Halloween costume, stands in front of the building where Dr. Craig Spencer lives in New York

By Joseph Ax

New Jersey’s mandatory quarantine for certain travelers from Ebola-stricken West Africa will likely face its first legal test this week, after a lawyer for a quarantined nurse said she would file a federal lawsuit within days.

Norman Siegel, a civil rights lawyer, said Kaci Hickox’s isolation upon her return from West Africa raised “serious constitutional and civil liberties issues,” given that she shows no Ebola symptoms and has not tested positive for the disease.

“We’re not going to dispute that the government has, under certain circumstances, the right to issue a quarantine,” said Siegel, who was on his way to visit Hickox in a New Jersey hospital. “The policy is overly broad when applied to her.”

The lawsuit would be the first to challenge the 21-day mandatory quarantine imposed by New Jersey for anyone arriving with a high risk of having contracted Ebola from Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, where the epidemic has killed nearly 5,000 people.

The case could also affect similar policies announced by other states including New York and Illinois.

The lawsuit will argue that Hickox’s constitutional right to due process was violated when she was forced into isolation, Siegel said.

State officials implemented a blanket policy without identifying a rational basis for confining asymptomatic individuals like Hickox, he said.

“The case law makes clear that the policy should be driven by medical fact, not fear,” he said.

Michelle Mello, professor of law and public health at Harvard University, said courts in such cases seek to balance the level of danger posed by the disease with the likelihood that the individual poses a public threat.

But she said courts have found reason to uphold past quarantines, even when there was no definitive proof the individuals were ill.

“I don’t think it is clear, but I suspect when all is said and done, it won’t be successful,” she said.

Lawrence Gostin, a Georgetown University law professor and health expert, said states’ authority to issue quarantine orders is broad, but not unlimited.

“I can’t recall a case in the 20th century where certain states are preparing to quarantine an entire class of people irrespective of their individualized risk,” he said. “It just flies in the face of science, ethics and law.”

In such cases, courts typically seek the least restrictive alternative, Gostin said, which might include voluntary confinement with monitoring. He said other quarantines, such as for drug-resistant tuberculosis, require a positive test.

Gostin has been in contact with Hickox via email to offer advice and support, he said.

Hickox, the first person isolated under the new orders, arrived on Friday at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey after working with Ebola patients in Sierra Leone.

In an interview with CNN on Sunday, Hickox criticized the policy, saying she is “completely healthy.”

But New Jersey Governor Chris Christie told Fox News on Sunday he would not back down. “This is government’s job … to protect the safety and health of our citizens.”

The White House, worried that the quarantine orders could impede the fight against Ebola, has voiced its concerns to the governors of New Jersey, New York and other states, a senior administration official said on Sunday.

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South Korea prosecutors seek death penalty for captain of doomed ferry

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Portraits of students who died in the mid-April Sewol ferry disaster, decorated by yellow ribbons dedicated to the victims, are pictured in central Seoul

By Ju-min Park

South Korean prosecutors on Monday sought the death penalty for the captain of a ferry that capsized in April, leaving 304 people, most of them school children, dead or missing in a trial of 15 crew who escaped the vessel before it sank.

Lee Joon-seok, 68, who has been charged with homicide, should be sentenced to death for failing to carry out his duty, which in effect amounted to homicide, the prosecution told the court, resting its case in a trial that has taken place amid intense public anger towards the crew.

Lee was among 15 accused of abandoning the sharply listing ferry after telling the passengers to stay put in their cabins. Four, including the captain, face homicide charges.

The rest face lesser charges, including negligence. A three-judge panel is expected to announce its verdicts in November. No formal pleas have been made but Lee has denied intent to kill.

Several defendants have been sentenced to death in South Korea in recent years, but none has been executed since 1997.

“Lee supplied the cause of the sinking of the Sewol … he has the heaviest responsibility for the accident,” the lead prosecutor in the case, Park Jae-eok, told the court in the south of the country.

“We ask that the court sentence him to death.”

The prosecutors sought life sentences for the other three charged with homicide and prison terms varying from 15 to 30 years for the rest.

The Sewol capsized and sank on a routine voyage on April 16, triggering an outpouring of nationwide grief and sharp criticism of the government of President Park Geun-hye for its handling of the rescue operation.

The crew members on trial have said they thought it was the coastguard’s job to evacuate passengers. Video footage of their escape triggered outrage, especially after survivors testified they repeatedly told passengers to stay put.

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Top Canada officials to face Parliament questioning after attacks

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Police officers wear gas masks during a mock "crisis response" exercise in Toronto

By Richard Valdmanis

Top Canadian security officials are due to testify on Monday before a parliamentary committee about threats facing the nation in the same building where a man described as an homegrown militant opened fire last week as Prime Minister Stephen Harper met with lawmakers.

On Sunday police said Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, the man who killed a Canadian soldier and attacked the Parliament building made a video of himself just before the attack, evidence that he was driven by ideological and political motives.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) said they were analyzing the video and could not release it at this time.

The head of the RCMP and a senior official at the Canadian Security Intelligence Service will likely face tough questions from a Senate committee about how Zehaf-Bibeau and another man, Martin Rouleau, 25, both described by police as homegrown radicals were able to kill two soldiers on Canadian soil last week in separate attacks.

The incidents have prompted Harper and his Conservative colleagues to scramble to strengthen anti-terrorism legislation and sparked questions about Canada’s culture of openness that allowed anyone to walk freely into the Ottawa parliament building.

RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson also could face questions about Zehaf-Bibeau. Paulson told reporters last week that he had come to Ottawa seeking a passport and intended to travel to Syria, a hotbed of Islamic militant activity.

But Zehaf-Bibeau’s mother, a top Canadian bureaucrat dealing with immigration issues who Paulson cited as the RCMP’s source for the information, denied his assertion. In a letter to news agency Postmedia, she said she told investigators her son told her he wanted to travel to Saudi Arabia to study the Koran.

Questions have also come up about how much information Canada shared with the United States about Zehaf-Bibeau and Rouleau, who ran over two Canadian soldiers in Quebec with a car, killing one, last week.

In the wake of Wednesday’s attack, some US officials raised concerns about security along the world’s longest undefended border.

Both Zehaf-Bibeau and Rouleau were shot dead by security officers.

While the two nations have long collaborated on intelligence matters, a Canadian official said on Saturday that the Canadian Security Intelligence Service did not share everything it knew about the two men with its US counterparts because of a 2013 court ruling limiting the transfer of personal data on Canadian citizens.

CSIS Assistant Director for Intelligence Michael Peirce is due to testify after Paulson.

The attacks came in the same week that Canada sent additional warplanes to the Middle East to take part in air strikes against Islamic State militants in Iraq. Canadian officials vowed their involvement would not be influenced by the attacks, but urged soldiers at home to maintain a low profile, including avoiding appearing in public in their uniforms when off duty.

On Tuesday a funeral will be held for Corporal Nathan Cirillo, 24, who police said was shot dead by Zehaf-Bibeau while standing watch at the nation’s war memorial before he ran into parliament.

The funeral for 53-year-old Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent, who police said was run down by a car driven by Rouleau on Oct. 20 outside Montreal will be on Saturday, Nov. 1.

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‘I’m not going anywhere’

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Attorney general Costas Clerides

Attorney General Costas Clerides on Monday dismissed reports that he is leaving his post for a position at the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) and that Justice Minister Ionas Nicolaou will be taking over as the new AG.

He was responding to a Sunday report by the newspaper 24, claiming that president Nicos Anastasiades was displeased with his performance and that he will be naming him as a candidate for the ECHR.
According to the report Nicolaou would be appointed in Clerides’ place. The report also claimed that assistant Attorney General Rikkos Erotokritou had strong objections to Nicolaou being named AG, claiming that he should be next in line.

“These reports are planted and only serve the interests and goals of the people behind them,” Clerides said in a statement, adding that he “ has never shown interest for the position at the ECHR and I will not abandon my country while we still are going through this particularly difficult period.”

ECHR judges are elected for a nine-year non-renewable term. The court is comprised of judges from all states that are party to the European Convention on Human Rights. Judges are elected by majority vote in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe from nominated candidates.

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Apartment fire leaves man in hospital

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A 51-year-old man from Bulgaria is in hospital with mild burns after fire broke out on Monday in the apartment block were he lives in the Tombs of the Kings area in Paphos.
According to the Fire Service, the fire broke out at around 7.30am from liquid petroleum gas combustion as he was preparing a hot drink.
Reportedly the tenants of the apartment next door were also in danger, but managed to exit the building with the help of firemen.
The fire, which was put out at around 8.10am, damaged extensively the apartment’s kitchen, walls and floor tiles, to the tune of around €10,000.
The service reported they put the fire out within four minutes of receiving a call.

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Former central bank chief given five month jail term

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By Angelos Anastasiou
Former Central Bank governor Christodoulos Christodoulou was on Monday morning sentenced to five months in prison and his company A.C. Christodoulou Consultants Ltd fined €13,500 in connection with tax offences relating to an undeclared €1 million cash transfer from a Greek shipowner in 2007.
Last month, Christodoulou pleaded guilty to six charges relating to tax offences in connection with the transfer from Greek ship-owner Michalis Zolotas to a company managed by his daughter, just a few months after his term as governor expired.
Christodoulou’s daughter Athina and her former husband, Andreas Kizourides, originally also accused along with Christodoulou, were acquitted after the former CBC governor’s guilty plea.
The prosecution later suspended seven lesser charges.
Earlier, Christodoulou had 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.
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, though Vgenopoulos has repeatedly rejected the connection.
Christodoulou also presented the court with a copy of an agreement between his daughter’s company and Focus.
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 allegedly transferred to an account in Laiki Bank.
Christodoulou had served as governor of the Central Bank of Cyprus from 2002 to 2007.
Speaking to the media after admitting to the tax evasion charges in September, Christodoulou said he had been vindicated by the fact that charges had been dropped.
“I neither stole, nor was I bribed,” he said. “My conscience is clear; I did my duty. I was honest and I have given this country more than I have taken.”
He said the whole affair was a smear campaign and half the island should have been charged with the same offences. Last week his lawyers cited his service in EOKA as a reason for the court to show leniency.

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Top Chinese prosecutor guarantees protection for whistleblowers

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By Sui-Lee Wee

China’s top prosecuting body said on Tuesday that whistleblowers who expose corruption and other wrongdoing would receive legal protection against reprisals.

President Xi Jinping has made fighting graft a central theme of his administration, warning that the problem was so severe it could threaten the survival of the ruling Communist Party.

The party is keen to harness the power of the Internet in the fight, although it has been hampered by public suspicion that complaints will be ignored, and also by arrests of and even attacks on online whistleblowers.

A statement on the website of the Supreme People’s Procuratorate said it was clarifying the rights of whistleblowers for the first time through new regulations.

“The ‘regulations governing the work of whistleblowers’ require that when the prosecutor’s office receives a whistleblowing report from someone giving their real name, it has to assess the risks from the whistleblowing and develop whistleblower protection plans when necessary to prevent and end acts of retaliation against the whistleblowers,” the statement said.

The prosecutor also promised to respond quickly to such reports.

Last year, the party’s anti-corruption watchdog, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, set up a new website for whistleblowers.

The government had previously set up a website in 2009 specifically for the reporting of corruption. Authorities have investigated some online accusations and jailed several low-level officials.

It is unclear how many tips the site has received in recent months. From 2008 to 2012 the commission said it received 301,000 whistleblowing reports online.

Still, Beijing does not give legal protection to people who make allegations outside government channels, by using the Twitter-like Weibo service, for example, or even in the mainstream media.

In mid-October, a Chinese investigative journalist who wrote reports critical of a state-controlled construction equipment maker was sentenced to prison after being found guilty of defamation and bribery.

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UK sentencing of Cypriot student adjourned until next month

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Stansted Airport

By Staff Reporter

The sentencing of a Cypriot student in Britain for taking eight explosive flares on to a plane at a major UK airport and possessing a terrorist manual, has been adjourned until November 7.

According to reports in the British press, Andreas Pierides, 22, a student at Southampton University, appeared in court on Monday.

The Omonia fan had been stopped on the gangway at Stansted Airport as he was about to board a flight to Cyprus on May 15. Police were alerted to Pierides after a member of the public spotted him on a train reading an electronic publication with instructions on how to make a car bomb on January 19.

As they arrested him, officers seized a box of distress signal mini-flares which they found inside luggage which had already been stowed on the plane.

But they handed them back in error after Pierides was charged for having a terrorist manual.

Five days later, police went to his bail address in north London to ask for the flares back and arrest him again, this time under the Aviation Security Act 1982.

At a hearing at the Old Bailey, Pierides, who may still face a jail sentence, pleaded guilty to a charge under the 2000 Terrorism Act of possessing an electronic version of the Anarchist Cookbook. He also admitted having a dangerous article in an airport.

During his court appearance on Monday Pierides said he only bought the flares to use if he ran into trouble while on his jetski, reports in the British press said.

“It was the first time I saw them where it said they were waterproof. If I wanted to use a flare at a football match I would use a handheld flare – you can get them anywhere in Cyprus. To light flares is something common in Cyprus,” he told the court.

It was also reported that Pierides’ uncle is employed at CID in Cyprus and his mother used to be a member of the rapid response unit MMAD before becoming a training officer in the Cypriot force.

The reports said he admitted having the anarchist cookbook and other documents in a folder titled ‘Anarchism’ but told the court: ‘I am not associated with the anarchist movement but I know things about anarchist and left wing and about right wing.’

Alistair Richardson, the prosecutor was quoted as saying: “He admitted in interview his links with a group of ultra supporters of the Omonia football team. He had photos demonstrating the link between Omonia and the use of flares at football stadia.” He also said that an analysis of Pierides phone showed text messages discussing the sale and purchase of fireworks, flares, firecrackers and smoke bombs.

“This is a man who has an obvious interest in flares linked to football,” said the prosecutor.

The court adjourned sentencing until November 7. Pierides remains out on conditional bail.

In an earlier hearing, the court heard that the flares had been packed in a compact box and would only have exploded if there had been an external fire aboard the aircraft.

Prosecutors said it was accepted that the defendant had been “stupid and naive” and did not associate with terrorists. The defence has pleaded for a suspended sentence.

 

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Banks still have their work cut out for them

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As much as EUR1.8bn could be outside the banking system due to hoarding of cash

By Elias Hazou

THREE of four Cyprus-based lenders may have got a clean bill of health in the eurozone-wide bank stress tests, but challenges still lie ahead both for the banking sector and the economy at large, analysts tell the Mail.

“The key challenge is to clear banks’ balance sheets of non-performing loans. Recouping bad loans is what will allow banks to ease lending, thereby boosting the economy, but of course this lending must be done prudently if we have learned anything from past experience,” economist Mike Spanos said.

Likewise Alex Apostolides, an economic historian with the European University Cyprus, observes that whereas Cypriot banks may be solvent and adequately capitalised, they cannot give out substantial new loans unless they first “sort out” the mess of non-performing loans (NPLs), which currently account for approximately 50 per cent of all loans.

The best way to accomplish that is by generating jobs, adds Apostolides.

“With the stress tests over, we can now put emphasis on the banking sector on the backburner and focus on structural reforms, such as public sector reform, improving the competitiveness of the economy. That is the way forward. Like I’ve said before, we need to take ownership of the Memorandum of Understanding.”

That was a somewhat more sombre reading than the upbeat assessments yesterday from public officials – including the finance minister and the Central Bank chief.

The stress tests have been successfully negotiated, but it’s the first of several hurdles ahead to put the economy back on a sound footing.

Bank of Cyprus may have passed the test, but not with flying colours. Taking into account the lender’s recent €1bn capital raise, it registered an overall
capital surplus of just €81m under the ECB’s draconian scenario.

The ECB’s passmark was for banks to have high-quality capital of at least 8 per cent of their risk-weighted assets, a measure of the riskiness of a banks’ loans and other assets, if the economy grows as expected over the next three years, and capital of at least 5.5 per cent if it slides into recession.

Under the adverse scenario, Bank of Cyprus scored 5.85 per cent, the Cooperative Central Bank 9.3 per cent and Russian Commercial Bank 11.6 per cent; Hellenic Bank failed at 1.7 per cent but the lender has a rights issue in the pipeline to raise additional capital.

With the €1bn capital raise, Bank of Cyprus registers 11.62 per cent by the baseline scenario and 5.85 per cent under the adverse. Had the capital increase not been taken into account, the lender would have scored 7.73 per cent and 1.51 per cent, respectively.

In plain speak, said Apostolides, the adverse scenario is a forecast of how economies will fare over the next three years.

“Basically it projects what will happen to banks’ balance sheets should unemployment go up,” he noted. Apostolides played down the fact that Bank of Cyprus only narrowly passed the ECB’s simulation exercise.

“In Cyprus’ case, there was not much difference between the normal and the adverse scenarios because we’re dealing with an economy that’s already in distress,” he offered.

Similarly, Spanos said the stress test results go to show that Bank of Cyprus carried out a thorough due diligence when planning the €1bn capital raise.
“They calculated how much they’d need to pass, and they got it spot-on right,” he said.

Another thing to consider is that the test results indicate the ECB did assume Cypriot banks’ increased ability to recover NPLs following passage of the foreclosures bill earlier this year, despite the fact the bill’s fate is still up in the air.

In hindsight, this suggests that stark warnings from the government camp and the Central Bank – to the effect that passage of the repossessions law with strings attached posed a severe risk to Cypriot lenders pending the stress tests – may well have been inflated.

Less exposure to shocks will be the major benefit to systemic Cypriot banks now coming under direct ECB supervision after passing the tests.

As Spanos explains, in addition to better supervision, the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) creates a buffer between bondholders and depositors. This “insurance cushion,” he said, will vary depending on the size of each bank.

Both analysts agreed that the results should start mending the public’s shattered confidence in banks, by putting paid to rumours of a new bail-in.

The received wisdom is that wary savers keeping their excess cash ‘under the mattress’ or in safety deposit boxes should now put the money back into the banks. Whether the return will take the form of a trickle or a torrent remains to be seen.

Marios Clerides, CEO of the Cooperative Central Bank (CCB) guessed yesterday that as much as €1.8bn was being kept outside the banking system.

Estimates vary on how much cash is being hoarded. The Mail is told that about a year ago the Central Bank calculated that approximately €1bn was out of the system. Whatever the real figure, it’s reasonable to assume that a sizeable amount of these savings have been spent.

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Stylianides says he will travel to Ebola-hit West Africa next month

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Humanitarian Aid and Crisis Management European Commissioner-designate Christos Stylianides of Cyprus addresses the European Parliament's Committee on Development, in Brussels

By Staff Reporter

Incoming Cypriot EU Humanitarian Aid Commissioner Christos Stylianides who was last week appointed the bloc’s Ebola ‘czar’ plans to visit stricken areas in Africa in the second week of November, news portal EurActive has reported.

Speaking to the press at the EU Emergency Response Coordination Centre (RCC) in Brussels, Stylianides, who officially takes up his post on November 1, said the Ebola epidemic threatened to extend far beyond Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.

According to the reports from Brussels, he said the international community was being put to the test and where applicable, it should admit where it had gone wrong, he said.

“Let us be sincere. In the case of the Ebola disease, the international community, all of us, underestimated the danger,” he said.

Stylianides said the EU had been one of the first to respond to the crisis, offering some €800 million in aid to battle the outbreak, though he said more needed to be done, and in a more coordinated way.

“The Ebola epidemic is putting the entire international community to the test,” he said. “The lives of thousands of people in Western Africa rest in our ability to take action today.”

Stylianides praised both local and international humanitarian workers who had taken the risk in order to help those countries badly in need of assistance.  He said that of those who had heeded the call, 443 had been infected with the deadly disease and almost half of those had died. There are some 2,000 Western volunteers currently on the ground, he added.

Stylianides said he himself would travel to West Africa early next month in order to send a message to the rest of the world that isolation was not the solution. Stylianides also said he would work closely with other EU member states, and the rest of the international community including the UN and the US to drum up more support and expertise through the RCC in Brussels.

“We need to mobilise immediately at least 40,000 staff,” he said. This number would include between 2,000 and 3,000 from Western countries, he added. There was also a shortage of beds in affected areas, Stylianides said.

EurActive quoted Claus Sorensen, the Director General of the European Commission´s Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection department (ECHO) as saying that the number of volunteers was not a problem, but that those needed to be people with the right skills, but even they would need further training, he said.

He said that 4,000 Germans had volunteered to go to West Africa to fight Ebola, but after screening, only a very small number was accepted.

Sorensen said that it was important to use the human potential of the region and spoke of very intensive training programmes and ways of mobilising health workers in Nigeria, Togo, Benin, Cote d’Ivoire, Mali and other countries.

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Politics of the Peace Prize

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A girl cuts a cake with others to celebrate after Malala Yousafzai won the Nobel Peace Prize during a cake-cutting ceremony in Malala's hometown of Mingora, Pakistan's Swat Valley

By Geir Lundestad,

The Nobel Peace Prize has frequently been called “the world’s most prestigious prize.” Some have nevertheless criticized it for being too political. The prize is indeed political in the sense that it deals with important political values and norms, and with political persons, organizations, and institutions. Peace obviously has to do with politics.

Yet, the prize is not political in the narrow sense of the term. Although for too long it focused on persons and organizations in Europe and North America, since the 1960s the laureates have come from all continents except Australia. The Nobel Committee never forgets that more than 60 percent of the world’s population lives in Asia. In recent decades, there have been many laureates from Asia, including this year’s Kailash Satyarthi and Malala Yousafzai.

Some of the laureates are quite far to the left in their national politics, and some are to the right. They represent many different religions, races, and countries. Sixteen of them are women – a high number only compared to the number of women who have won other Nobel prizes.

If most of the 125 laureates have anything in common, I would point to vision and courage. They have ambitious goals, and in trying to reach those goals, many of them have shown great personal courage. This is definitely the case with this year’s laureates, with their sharp focus, respectively, on the abolition of child labour and on girls’ rights to an education, and the way in which their lives have been dramatically threatened.

Another frequent criticism of the prize is that it lacks real substance. It is definitely true that the prize is no magic wand. You cannot wave it and make whatever problem it addresses disappear. No one can produce such results. A committee of five unknown Norwegians certainly cannot.

The prize is primarily a high honor – possibly the highest honor that can be bestowed on a person or an organization. For the lesser-known laureates, it also acts as a loudspeaker, opening virtually all doors for them. Some laureates have even been protected by the prize.

Occasionally, the prize may produce some political result. The Nobel Committee has given prizes, for instance, to four South Africans: Albert Lutuli (1960), Desmond Tutu (1984), Nelson Mandela (1993), and F.W. de Klerk (1993). Granting Lutuli the prize, in particular, may have helped strengthen the opposition to apartheid.

Lech Walesa has many times claimed that without the Nobel Peace Prize (which he received in 1983), he would never have been able to accomplish what he did in Poland in 1989 – and he did more than anyone else (with the exception of Mikhail Gorbachev, another laureate) to liberate Central and Eastern Europe from Soviet Communism.

As a result of the prizes awarded to Carlos Belo and José Ramos-Horta (1996), the people of East Timor give the Nobel Committee a lot of credit for the fact that their country became independent. And when the Chinese government is so afraid of the impact of dissident Liu Xiaobo’s receipt of the Nobel Peace Prize (2010), it is indeed a testimony to the effects of the prize. Not bad for a committee of five largely unknown Norwegians.

fkiaGeir Lundestad is the Director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute and Permanent Secretary of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which awards the Nobel Peace Prize. Mr. Lundestad is retiring from this position in December of this year.



This article first appeared in www.themarknews.com

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Time changes for Paphos airport shuttle

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Kapnos

Kapnos Airport Shuttle has changed its timetable from Nicosia to Paphos airport via Larnaca town centre. The new timetable came into effect on Sunday, the company said in an announcement on Tuesday.

The new timetable based on the 24-hour clock is as follows:

From Nicosia via Larnaca to Paphos airport;

Monday: 3.30, 7.30, 15.30

Tuesday: 3.30, 8.30, 15.30

Wednesday: 3.30, 15.30

Thursday: 3.30, 8.30, 15.30

Friday: 3.30, 7.30, 15.30

Saturday: 3.30, 8.30, 15.30

Sunday: 3.30, 15.30

From Paphos airport to Nicosia via Larnaca as follows:

Monday: 11.00, 18.45, 23.30

Tuesday: 11.45, 18.45, 23.30

Wednesday: 19.00, 23.30

Thursday: 11.45, 18.45, 23.30

Friday: 11.00, 18.45, 23.30

Saturday: 11.45, 18.45, 23.30

Sunday: 19.00, 23.30

The company said it had also carried out a survey recently on the Paphos airport route, involving 250 passengers. According to the results, 195 were satisfied with the service in all respects. With regards to the professionalism and attitude of staff at the Kapnos offices, 245 of the 250 passengers were satisfied. On the comfort and cleanliness of the buses 210 from the 250 were satisfied while 225 from the total were satisfied with the professionalism of the drivers. As regards the routes, frequency and punctuality, 150 said they were totally satisfied.

 

Kapnos Airport Shuttle Tel 77771477; email: info@kapnosairportshuttle.com

website: http://www.kapnosairportshuttle.com/?locale=en

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Suspect in Mall stabbing apprehended

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shopping mall

A 34-year-old Palestinian man was arrested on Tuesday, in connection with the stabbing of a security guard at the Mall of Cyprus in Nicosia last week.

The security guard was stabbed three times and the assailant only stopped after the blade broke off from the handle. The security guard, a man from Bulgaria, is in stable condition.

The 34-year-old was subsequently spotted at the north. He was arrested and delivered to the Cypriot authorities through the United Nations. He is expected to appear before court on Wednesday.

Police are looking to charge the 34-year-old with attempted murder, causing grievous bodily harm and possession of drugs.

The incident took place on Thursday at around 2pm. The 34-year-old went inside the Mall and attacked the security guard with a knife. He then ran outside, got in a vehicle and fled to the north.

 

 

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Referees urged to get to grips with grapplers

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Chelsea captain John Terry said he and Branislav Ivanovic were ‘double headlocked at every corner’ during the league leaders’ 1-1 draw at Old Trafford on Sunday

By Sam Holden

REFEREES need to clamp down on serial holders and grapplers who are getting away with ‘cheating’ according to former Premier League official Graham Poll.

Manchester United players, defending a free kick, wrestled two Chelsea players to the ground in the penalty box at Old Trafford on Sunday, the latest in a series of goalmouth grapples.

Referee Phil Dowd was unmoved by protests from John Terry and Branislav Ivanovic and the fouls, by Chris Smalling and Marcos Rojo, went unpunished.

Chelsea captain Terry said he and Ivanovic were “double headlocked at every corner” during the league leaders’ 1-1 draw.

Poll, who refereed in the Premier League for 14 years until retiring in 2007, said it was time for officials to be more pro-active and show a player a yellow card for holding an attacker before a set-piece is taken, as a deterrent.

“It is time to now deal with grappling and holding in the penalty area,” he wrote in his column for the Daily Mail on Monday. “Tackling this issue is long overdue. It’s not about a change in the law, it’s about the appropriate enforcement of the law.

“Grabbing, holding, grappling; however you describe it, is pure cheating. It’s an issue that is preventing goals from being scored.
“Giving a penalty is a massive thing for a referee, but interrupting the game before a corner or free kick can be taken to issue a yellow card to culprits is easily enforceable.

“We already see referees prevent corners being taken so they can verbally warn players about holding and grappling. It’s time for the talk to stop and the cards to come out,” Poll, who refereed at two World Cups, added.

Dowd may have failed to punish United’s hands-on approach to defending at the weekend but his fellow referees have previously taken action against what many pundits are calling ‘the dark arts’.

Two weeks ago, a penalty was awarded when Stoke City defender Ryan Shawcross was penalised for holding Swansea City’s Wilfred Bony as a corner was taken, and the Ivorian striker duly dispatched the spot kick.

Shawcross’ offence was less blatant than that at Old Trafford but perhaps he was being watched more closely. He holds the unenviable record of conceding the most penalties in the league since the 2008-09 season with his tally at seven.

When referees met every Premier League club before the start of the season to discuss the interpretation of the laws of the game, neither the players nor the managers at each club saw grappling in the box as a problem to be addressed.

If clubs did want officials to tackle the issue they could raise it with the Referees’ Association but until there is a groundswell of support for tougher action from teams, the league will not change the way these incidents are handled.

Former Chelsea captain Ron Harris, who made a record 795 appearances for the club and was renowned for his tough approach to defending, said wrestling was a modern phenomenon that could be stopped only if referees started awarding penalties.

“It happens in every Premier League game every week,” he told Reuters in an interview on Monday. “It’s a disease that has come into the game in the last few years and it’s getting worse and worse.

“If you did the same (grappling) outside of the box it would be given. Most referees aren’t brave enough to give penalties but if they did defenders would stop doing it.

“Most defenders don’t even look at the ball nowadays, they’re too busy manhandling their opponent. It didn’t happen in my playing days, you were too busy defending the ball.”

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Prominent defector says North Korea has taken his father hostage

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shin

By James Pearson and Sohee Kim

A prominent North Korean defector who has advocated UN action to stop the country’s human rights abuses said on Tuesday authorities have taken his father hostage in a campaign to discredit his story of survival and escape from a prison camp.

North Korea has been on a diplomatic campaign to counter charges by a UN commission that highlighted widespread human rights abuses and a move by some member states to refer it to an international tribunal for crimes against humanity.

North Korea says the accusations of human rights abuses are fabrications and “wild rumours” peddled by “hostile forces” determined to undermine its leadership, and points to the United States as the mastermind.

Shin Dong-hyuk is one of the most prominent defectors from North Korea whose account of torture and escape from a political prison camp gripped international investigators examining the North’s human rights conditions.

He said the North had put his father in a propaganda video released this week that portrays Shin as a criminal active in fabricating human rights problems.

“The dictator is holding my father hostage,” Shin said in a post on his Facebook page on Tuesday, referring to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. The page carried a series of still images of an elderly man taken from the video interview.

The man in the video, which was seen by Reuters, was speaking in a modestly furnished Korean-style living room. He urges Shin to “come to your senses and return to the embrace of the Party,” referring to the North’s ruling Workers’ Party, which Kim Jong Un heads.

Speaking to Reuters later by telephone from South Korea, where he lives, Shin said he could not be sure where the video was taken or whether his father had been brought from a prison camp to produce the footage.

“I had thought my father had died. But this is definitely my father,” he said. “I’d never thought I’d be grateful to North Korea … for showing me that he is alive.”

“I think it’s probably because of everything that’s going on at the United Nations … maybe the message is if I refuse to be quiet, they will kill him.”

LAZY AND UNRELIABLE

The video was titled “Truth and Lies” and was released by the China-based Website Uriminzokkiri, which carries pro-North Korea propaganda, aimed at Koreans abroad.

It also showed people it said knew Shin before his escape and by his former name “Shin In Gun”.

Those interviewed in the video said Shin was lazy and unreliable as a worker at a mine, and he left the country to avoid punishment for the rape of a 13-year-old girl and he now spread “preposterous false information” about human rights.

Shin said the accusation of sexual assault was a fabrication which he had heard before.

Neither the narrator in the video nor any of the people filmed made any mention of North Korea’s network of prison camps where political prisoners are tortured and undergo forced labour, according to testimony from defectors, including Shin.

There are 150,000-200,000 people in North Korean prison camps, according to international human rights groups, and defectors say many inmates are malnourished or worked to death.

Shin has said he endured starvation and torture in a prison camp that has left his arms disfigured and back permanently scarred.

He has testified at UN hearings and for the UN Commission of Inquiry report into North Korean human rights abuses that has become the basis of the move at the United Nations to refer the state to the International Criminal Court.

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Thieves break into jewellery shop through abandoned building

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police tape 6

Jewellery worth around €15,000 was stolen from a shop in Limassol in the early hours of Tuesday after the thieves broke in through an abandoned building next door, police said.

Police said the burglars had made a hole in the wall between the abandoned premises and the shop on Ayios Fylaxeos Street. They did trigger the alarm around 3am but had already fled before the owner and police arrived, grabbing whatever loot they could.

CCTV footage showed two men wearing hoods and gloves.  The owner said he had locked up his most expensive items in the safe, which the thieves did not manage to locate.

 

 

 

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