By George Psyllides

Fifty people and companies, including developers and football clubs, owe the state over €163 million in taxes it emerged on Monday, following the leak of a confidential finance ministry list submitted to parliament.

The list includes first division clubs, developers, hoteliers and other businesses that owe the state between €1.5 million and €14.7 million – the highest amount.

The state has filed lawsuits against most and has made collection arrangements with others. Restrictions have also been placed on immovable property.

Nicosia football clubs Omonia and APOEL owe around €7 million and €6 million respectively. AEL of Limassol and Anorthosis Famagusta owe €2.2 million and €3.1 million respectively. The list includes a second entry for Anorthosis, which owes €2.4 million. All the clubs have made arrangements with the state for repayment of the amounts.

The state has also filed a lawsuit against APOEL and restrictions have been placed on property.

Included in the list is NK Shacolas Group LTD, which owes €6.8 million, Miltiades Neophytou LTD, €5.7 million, Athienitis developers, €4.2 million, Giovani developers, €3.6 million, Venus Rock Estates, €2 million, Aristo developers, €1.8 million, Pafilia, €1.7 million, and Christophoros Karayiannas and Son Ltd, €1.5 million.

The list does not include amounts which have been appealed nor the names of individuals and companies who have gone bankrupt or are under administration.

It was submitted after Green party MP Giorgos Perdikis accused Finance Minister Harris Georgiades of providing cover to tax evaders.

Perdikis had asked for the names of the people and companies who owed the most to the tax department.

Georgiades said it was a matter of confidentiality, clearly stipulated in tax legislation.

“Fully respecting the right of every MP to exercise critic, I consider the references unfair and excessive, especially when restrictions arise from legal provisions that parliament has passed,” Georgiades said in a letter accompanying the list.

Confidentiality can be lifted for reasons of public interest, the minister said, but the tax commissioner decided no such reason existed in relation with the MP’s request.

However, the law also afforded the minister the power to have the final say and allows him to give the list to the house president, exclusively for parliamentary oversight reasons, with the proviso that it would be handled confidentially and its publication would be avoided so as not to hurt public trust.

Link to the list [Greek only] here: lista.pdf (1)

By Evie Andreou

A bill aiming to legalise abortions has been prepared and is to come under discussion at House committee level.

The proposal aims to give women the right to terminate pregnancy at under 12 weeks without having to give explanations, or without having to present a medical condition that would prevent them carrying to term.

House legal affairs committee deputy, DISY’s Rikkos Mappourides said it was not certain yet whether the bill would come under the legal affairs or health committees but it was, he said, “a step to the right direction”.

According to current legislation, abortions are legal only when a pregnancy was caused by rape – an initial provision that goes back to the aftermath of the 1974 Turkish invasion – and currently if the demand for the abortion is accompanied by police verification and a medical verification where possible. The procedure can be carried out up to 19 weeks in this sn instances.

Abortion is also legal if the pregnancy is deemed threatening to the life of the mother or could cause greater  “physical or mental damage” to her or her other children had the pregnancy not been terminated.

A woman is also allowed to terminate her pregnancy in the case of “substantial risk that the foetus could suffer from physical or mental anomalies that would constitute it severely handicapped,” current legislation provides.

“On the basis of this provision, women are obliged to invoke one of the above reasons to be approved for abortion; meaning, something that should be the inalienable right of women to decide, is not taken into account by the legislation,” the proposal said.

The proposal also provides that state hospitals should offer abortions since high costs – between €400 and €800 – prompt women to resort to other solutions, like pharmaceutical concoctions that may harm their health.

In July 2013, the state pharmaceutical services confiscated hundreds of prescription drugs ordered over the internet during a search in post offices and among them drugs used for abortion which could cause death to the mother.

The current law provides for up to 14 years imprisonment to doctors who perform abortions and seven years  for women who terminate outside of the existing legal provisions, though it is an open secret that abortions are carried out despite the law.

According to the new proposal, a pregnancy could be terminated at under 12 weeks if requested.

“If according to the opinions of two doctors, the baby would suffer from such physical or mental abnormalities as to be seriously handicapped, abortion will be legal up to 24 weeks,” the proposal said.

In cases concerning minors, consent from one parent or legal guardian will be required.

According to Dr Arne Bjornberg, the president of the Health Consumer Powerhouse (HCP), which produces the Euro Health Consumer Index (EHCI) annually, abortion ban in Cyprus “is bad both for human rights and for women’s health”.

In December the European Parliament plenary, called to vote a proposal that recognised the right of every woman to decide freely on abortions, voted for an amendment which provides that abortion regulation is subject to national legislation.

By Stelios Orphanides

European creditors should give Greece’s prime minister Alexis Tsipras a chance to implement his reform programme which includes scrapping austerity and taxing the rich, a government source in Nicosia said.

“Our position is that Greece has to get support but the main negotiations will be with the creditors,” the source who spoke on condition of anonymity said today in a telephone interview. “We are going to argue that since Greece has a new government it deserves to get a chance but again, it does not depend on us”.

The government official said that while the Cypriot government will argue in favour of Greece, it will be up to the “International Monetary Fund and Germany” to do the talking at the extraordinary euro area finance minister meetings, also known as eurogroup, scheduled for Wednesday, February 11, to discuss Greece’s request for a bridging financing which will allow the government implement its own reform programme.

The prime minister who was visiting Cyprus a week ago, said during his meeting with president Nicos Anastasiades that “all he wanted was time to implement his reform plan but you can never know for sure”.

Tsipras told Anastasiades that unlike his predecessor Antonis Samaras, he intends to clamp down on tax evasion instead of slashing salaries and pensions.

Tsipras, who is the leader of Syriza, which is the acronym of the Coalition of Radical Left, told lawmakers yesterday that he revert reforms agreed with international creditors as part of Greece’s 240 billion euros bailout, including a hiring freeze in the public sector, increase the minimum wage and scrapping an unpopular tax on real property.

While the Cypriot government is in favour of a compromise at the eurogroup which would allow

Greece remain in the euro area “the final decision will be taken by Greece,” the government source said adding that the prime minister’s speech at the parliament yesterday “didn’t leave any margins for a compromise, unless all this is part of their negotiation tactics”.

Still, the Cypriot government is not talking currently about a Grexit, as Greece’s probable exit from the euro area is also called, the official said adding “we are prepared for all contingencies”.

Cyprus was one of the countries which helped bailout Greece in 2010 and 2012. In 2010, Cyprus extended a direct loan of 109 million euros to the government in Athens, and provided 283 million euros in guarantees to the European Financial Stability Fund, which financed the second Greek bailout as well as those of Ireland and Portugal.

There has never been, and indeed there is no question of Russian air or naval military bases on Cypriot soil, said Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides, on the sidelines of the Foreign Affairs Council, in Brussels.

“Besides, there has never been any request from Russia about this”, the minister told the Cyprus News Agency.
Kasoulides clarified that “what President Nicos Anastasiades referred to, in a recent interview, was the renewal of a military cooperation agreement with Russia consisting of maintenance of military equipment sold to Cyprus years ago, as well as the purchase of spare parts in line with existing contracts.”
As regards offering facilities “these are of a purely non-military nature, they relate to humanitarian nature matters such as the evacuation of Russian civilians from the Middle East if the need arises”.

By Elias Hazou

The troika of international lenders have given Cyprus just two more months to enact legislation on reform of local government, interior minister Socrates Hasikos said on Monday.

The bill must be completed and voted on by April, Hasikos said, adding that no more extensions would be granted.

Hasikos called on all stakeholders – the union of municipalities as well as political parties – to give their feedback and any proposals on the government draft bill as soon as possible in order to meet that deadline.

“It is only through consensus that we shall achieve reform,” the minister told reporters.

On Wednesday Hasikos will be discussing the draft bill with main opposition AKEL.

Although overhaul of local administration is a condition stemming from the bailout agreement with international creditors, even without this obligation there would still be a pressing need for reform, the minister noted.

This is the second draft bill prepared by the government. The first was scrapped after it was roundly rejected by all stakeholders back in October, forcing the interior ministry back to the drawing board.

AKEL in particular had at the time criticised the government for going it alone without consulting anyone.

The first bill’s philosophy revolved around achieving economies of scale via the clustering of services provided by the dozens of municipalities. But the municipalities as well as the parties – including ruling DISY – had said the methods proposed would end up raising the cost of local government instead of lowering it – the overriding objective.

Produced with the advice of foreign experts, the first blueprint provided for the creation of second-tier bodies of local government, taking powers away from municipalities and giving them to the new bodies – one for every district.

It also provided for less staff – between 15 per cent and 20 per cent – with excess personnel taking early retirement or opting for transfer to other state departments. Salaries account for an estimated 50 per cent of municipalities’ operating expenses.

By Steve Scherer

At least 25 migrants died of hypothermia aboard Italian coast guard vessels after being picked up from an inflatable boat adrift near Libya, the chief health official on the Italian island of Lampedusa said on Monday.

Two patrol boats picked up 105 migrants late on Sunday from the boat drifting in extreme sea conditions, with waves as high as 8 metres (26 feet) and temperatures just a few degrees above zero, the coast guard said in a statement.

The migrants then spent around 18 hours on the decks of the small patrol boats taking them to Lampedusa, buffeted by high winds and spray, and at least 25 died en route of hypothermia, Pietro Bartolo, the chief healthcare official on the island, told Reuters.

“They were all soaking wet in high seas and strong winds,” Bartolo said.

Italy ended its search-and-rescue mission, known as Mare Nostrum, last year. Since then no navy ships capable of keeping large numbers of migrants below deck have patrolled the waters near the Libyan coast.

The patrol boats now sent from Lampedusa are small vessels that cannot accommodate many people below deck. Human rights groups warned that closing the Mare Nostrum mission would endanger lives.

Mare Nostrum was abandoned partly due to public concern over the 114 million euro ($129 million) cost of the mission in its first year. Now the European Union is running a border control operation, called Triton, with fewer ships and a much smaller area of operations.

Lawmakers want to include banks in a law banning usury and profiteering but the Central Bank said Cyprus must first ask the EU.

The issue was discussed in a joint session of the House Finance and Interior Committees.

Banks are exempted from the law, passed in 2011, but MPs now think it should change.

MPs do not even think they must ask the European Central Bank before changing the law – as a Central Bank (CBC) official warned.

“We are not saying we will be setting interest rates,” DIKO’s Angelos Votsis said, adding that there are countries that do not exempt banks from the law.

The reference rate is set by the Central Bank every three months and if exceeded it is considered a violation of the law.

Currently, the reference rate is set at 11 per cent and it has never gone over 12.5 per cent.

The CBC official said some EU state members, which have a maximum lending rate, also had rates ranging between 16 per cent and 25 per cent.

And there was another problem.

“When banks know there such a rate they tend to approach it,” the official said. “It is a double-edged sword.”

No one will be spared from paying the full amount due on immovable property tax (IPT) as well as any penalties for delayed payment, interior minister Socrates Hasikos said on Monday.

“Rest assured that all debtors, large and small, who owe tax will pay, and with the penalties provided by law,” Hasikos told reporters.

He was being quizzed about the government’s thoughts on IPT arrears, shortly after his colleague the finance minister had handed parliament a list of the top 50 tax debtors.

Hasikos said IPT debtors have been tracked down and pressure is being brought to bear on them to pay up.
But he added that a proportion of large debtors who failed to settle last year have also not paid up so far this year as well.

Property owners have until April 25 to appeal the government’s valuation of their real estate and correct any other mistakes made in the process of fixing IPT.

The three-month extension – the previous deadline was end of January 2015 – was approved in a law passed last November by the House plenum.

Owners can file an appeal by paying a fee that depends on the value of their property.

The new 2013 property values have been published on the land registry’s website. These new values will be used for accessing and paying IPT from 2015. For 2014, IPT was assessed using the old 1980 valuation.

Authorities have received thousands of complaints from people about errors made in the new valuations.

By Erik Kirschbaum

Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis has become an improbable heartthrob inGermany, where his demands to renegotiate the nation’s debt fell on deaf ears but his charm and masculine appearance have not gone unnoticed.

Germany’s ZDF public television even lampooned its own news anchor for enthusiastic comparing the minister with Hollywood tough guy Bruce Willis, while Stern magazine published a gushing article on Varoufakis’s “classical masculinity”.

“Varoufakis is without doubt a man full of charisma,” ZDF anchor Marietta Slomka said on air. “Visually, he’s someone you could imagine starring in a film like ‘Die Hard 6′ – he’s an interesting character.”

The host of the ZDF parody “Heute Show”, Oliver Welke, ridiculed his “lovestruck” colleague over the 53-year-old Varoufakis but admitted: “He is an incredibly attractive man.”

Varoufakis’s casual tie-less appearance – especially the fact that he does not tuck his dress shirts in and leaves their tops unbuttoned – was an unlikely focus of news reports in Germany, an unusual angle in a country whose leaders have been firmly insisting on Greece fulfilling austerity pledges.

“What makes Yanis Varoufakis a sex icon” was a headline in conservative newspaper Die Welt over a story that raved about “his balding head, cool style and muscular Yamaha motorcycle”.

“Even though Greece’s debts are causing a lot of stress, their new finance minister is anything but dull,” wrote Die Welt, a daily close to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives.

“A star is born,” it added. “He hasn’t forced any of the creditors to their knees but the economics professor is shaking up the suits in Europe with a casual appearance and cool stare.”

Stern magazine wrote that Varoufakis’s appearance reminded Germans of Greek heroes immortalised in marble statues, even though media elsewhere in Europe have said he looked more like a night club bouncer.

“He rattles around Athens on a big, black motorcycle, never tucks his shirts in and radiates a sort of classical masculinity that you only usually see in Greek statues,” Stern wrote. “He’s not one of the world’s most respected economists, but a man whose good looks separate him from all the grey suits.”

“He’s someone you take notice of,” wrote Focus newsweekly.

Germany’s Stylebook fashion magazine also took notice. “His cool style is something you can’t miss,” Stylebook wrote under a story entitled “poor but sexy”.

By Angeliki Koutantou

Greece’s new government will take steps to halt a Canadian-run gold mine project and aims to cancel a development scheme at Athens’ former airport, pressing ahead with plans to roll back the country’s privatisation programme.

The government is dominated by the left-wing Syriza party, which has for years opposed the Skouries gold mine in northern Greece, operated by Vancouver-based Eldorado Gold Corp.

It argues that the project, among the biggest foreign investments in the country, is harming the environment.

“We are against the gold investment in Skouries and we will use all possible legal means to back our position,” Energy Minister Panagiotis Lafazanis told lawmakers on Tuesday, reinforcing signals that the government will stick to anti-privatisation pledges made during campaigning for last month’s vote.

Lafazanis, who represents Syriza’s more radical wing, said the government would also look to annul development plans for the capital’s former airport at Hellenikon.

“The plans for developing Hellenikon are extremely destructive to the environment,” Lafazanis said. “We will review this scandalous purchase with the aim to cancel it.”

Greece agreed last year to sell the Hellenikon site to Greek developer Lamda, backed by China’s Fosun and an Abu Dhabi-based firm, for 915 mln euro, pending parliamentary approval.

Investors were expected to spend about 6 billion euros turning the abandoned area into a tourist and business centre.

The government has already said it will cancel the sale of a stake in Greece’s two biggest ports, Piraeus and Thessaloniki, and in power grid operator ADMIE.

A finance ministry official was quoted by local media as saying that Greece was in favour of privatisating Piraeus Port. But the finance ministry dismissed the reports on Tuesday.

The privatisations of the country’s dominant power utility PPC and state natural gas company DEPA have also been halted.

By Nick Vinocur

Two women switched at birth more than 20 years ago will both receive 400,000 euros ($451,760) in damages, a court in southern France ruled on Tuesday.

The court in the town of Grasse also ordered that the private clinic responsible for the mixup pay 300,000 euros each to three of the parents concerned, as well as 60,000 euros each to the brothers and sisters of the plaintiffs.

One of the two mothers discovered that her child was not biologically hers when they took a DNA test in 2004, 10 years after the girl’s birth.

Both girls were suffering from jaundice at birth and were placed in the same incubator at the clinic in Cannes, on the Mediterranean coast.

A nurse then switched the babies upon returning them to their respective mothers. The women expressed doubts about the identities of the babies at the time, but were told that no mistake had been made.

The families had sought 12 million euros in damages.

By George Psyllides

The medical association (PIS) on Tuesday urged authorities to co-operate to stamp out sickies in the public sector, asking for suspicious cases to be referred to them for investigation.

The association’s announcement came four days after Interior Minister Socratis Hasikos described the phenomenon of pulling sickies as a scourge affecting the entire civil service.

PIS urged Hasikos and other senior officials in the public sector to report any suspicious cases to them.

It highlighted the lack of co-operation from government departments.

It said that when it asked for information so that it could investigate a complaint at a government department, the officials refused citing personal data issues.

“When we suggested covering the names so that we could study the facts of each case without violating their personal data, they told us they would look into it,” PIS said. “We haven’t had a response since.”

PIS reiterated the need for co-operation, “no matter how difficult it may be” to substantiate a few cases at least and stamp out the provocative phenomenon.

The association said it briefed its members frequently, urging them to be strict in observing the code of conduct which calls on doctors to be pillars and pioneers of medical ethics.

Last week, Hasikos suggested drastic measures must be put in place to stop those workers who cited illness to be continuously absent from work.

One way of punishing them is transfers far away from home, the minister said.

He also suggested prosecuting the doctors who issued the fake certificates.

Hasikos said people pulling sickies exacerbated the staff shortages in some departments.

Going after those who help them would prevent them from leaving their job, the minister said.

By Angelos Anastasiou

Over 300 Cyprus-affiliated individuals or companies have money sitting in Swiss bank accounts according to the findings of an investigation of over 100,000 HSBC clients from 203 countries by the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), it was reported on Tuesday.

Scrutiny of leaked documents removed from the bank in 2008 by former IT technician turned whistleblower Herve Falciani by the ICIJ produced a list of clients who maintained accounts with HSBC Switzerland in 2006 and 2007.

These involved total amounts upwards of $100 billion, a part of which formed the infamous ‘Lagarde list’ of some 2,000 Greek tax evaders handed by the French finance ministry to their Greek counterparts in 2010 – and then again in 2012 – with no action taken thus far by the Greek government.

The House Ethics committee, which discussed the issue on Tuesday, decided to ask the finance minister to obtain the list and submit it to the House.

The 308 individuals or companies affiliated with Cyprus maintained 553 individual accounts in the Swiss bank from 1996 to 2006, 25 per cent of whom belong to Cypriot nationals.

“The issue of the ‘Lagarde list’ was discussed, and it was decided that contact with the finance ministry resumes so that the committee receives all the evidence,” acting committee chairman Demetris Syllouris said. “The necessity for this becomes even direr following reports of Cypriot names included on the list.”

Syllouris said that Cyprus “could not have been the altar for the movement of money, or hiding capital, or graft, which is all the more reason why we should have the list so that we can escape the platitudes”.

“This is information that, when made public, should start to reduce the unacceptable view that we are all the same,” he said.

In response, the Finance ministry issued a statement saying that the European Union’s Savings Directive mandates several countries, including Switzerland, to withhold tax levied on savings interest, and forward the equivalent to the account-holder’s national Central Bank.

“The rest of the member states which implement the Savings Directive are obligated to provide the Cypriot Taxation Department detailed information on Cyprus residents’ interest income,” the statement said. “Identification records include the depositor’s full name, date of birth, and address.”

Additionally, the Finance ministry said the Taxation Department has signed double taxation avoidance agreements with approximately 50 countries, meaning it may request and obtain data on Cypriot taxpayers from each of these countries.

“With regard to various lists reported on at various times, it is noted that there is no specific information, either relating to their validity or the way they were obtained,” the statement read. “Nevertheless, recent information regarding such lists will be investigated with a view to obtaining them.”

Citing Greek newspaper Ta Nea, which was the only Greek participant in the ICIJ investigation, local daily Phileleftheros reported that one Cypriot construction magnate with significant activity in Greece and other countries was found to hold an account with a balance of approximately $18 million.

Other international entries released by the ICIJ include soccer and tennis professionals, rock stars and Hollywood actors.

But, the consortium, said, although some of the information gathered suggests that tax-evasion manoeuvres were employed by the bank and its clients in some cases, this does not necessarily involve everyone listed.

“There are legitimate uses for Swiss bank accounts and trusts,” a disclaimer read on the ICIJ’s website. “We do not intend to suggest or imply that any persons, companies or other entities included […] have broken the law or otherwise acted improperly.”

HSBC Switzerland found itself embroiled in a financial scandal of global proportions after the leaked documents suggested it may have helped some of its high-profile clients hide billions of dollars from national tax collectors.

And, there was a failed attempt by former Greek finance minister Georgios Papakonstantinou to remove the names of three relatives that resulted in him facing corruption charges before a Greek court.

By George Psyllides

Cyprus will work to prevent Greece’s exclusion from international markets and financial assistance programmes, finance minister Harris Georgiades said on Tuesday, ahead of Wednesday’s critical eurogroup meeting.

“We must prevent this eventuality and Cyprus’ efforts will focus on this direction,” Georgiades said.

“We will be supporters without expecting anything in return.”

The new Greek government wants to ditch its bailout programme – or part of it at least – putting it at odds with its EU partners. Some analysts have suggested that Greece would have no choice but to leave the common currency with whatever that would entail.

Georgiades added that Cyprus was following its own course, which is already yielding results.

“We are looking at the examples of countries like Ireland, which has implemented its own programme with success and today it is the economy with the highest rate of growth in the entire EU,” he said.

The finance minister said Cyprus knew what to do to recover and “I hope that Greece, through its own decisions and those of the Eurogroup will be able to move towards a similar prospect.”

Georgiades said the fastest way to get rid of the Troika (European Commission, IMF, ECB) was to restore the island’s access to international markets.

“An objective, which is fully feasible.”

The minister took a shot at opposition parties whose insistence in suspending the law on foreclosures has deprived Cyprus of an €86 million tranche and dealt a blow to its credibility.

The suspension of the assistance, credibility and inability to utilise important tools like the ECB’s quantitative easing programme should be of concern, the minister said.

“We want to be able to exploit opportunities the moment they appear and not be led into fresh problems without reason and because of undue approaches,” Georgiades said.

Opposition parties claim the suspension of the foreclosures law was the government’s fault for not submitting the insolvency framework – legislation seen as a safety net for vulnerable groups – in time.

The government says foreclosures could not go ahead anyway due to the lack of the necessary regulations, which are yet to be drafted.

Observers view the opposition’s move as a populist tactic, which, at the same time, provides protection to big borrowers, mainly developers.

Newsweek magazine’s Twitter account was the victim of hackers on Tuesday who posted a threat to U.S. President Barack Obama and his family and the words “CyberCaliphate” and “Je suis IS,” a reference to Islamic State and the French magazine Charlie Hebdo.

The group, which also took responsibility for hacking Pentagon social media accounts last month, tweeted “#CyberCaliphate Bloody Valentine’s Day #MichelleObama! We’re watching you, your girls and your husband!”

It also posted a message intended for the United States in retaliation for its actions in the Muslim world.

“While the U.S. and its satellites are killing our brothers in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, we are destroying your national cybersecurity system from inside,” it said.

The message contained a list of names under the heading “brave mujahideen.”

Newsweek removed the CyberCaliphate banner and tweets by mid-morning. It was not immediately clear how long the intrusion lasted.

The group took responsibility for the intrusion last month of the Twitter and YouTube accounts for the U.S. Central Command, which oversees operations in the Middle East. The hackers claimed to be sympathetic toward the Islamic State militant group being targeted in American bombing raids.

By Jeff Mason and Phil Stewart

US President Barack Obama on Tuesday confirmed the death of Kayla Mueller, a US aid worker who had been held hostage by Islamic State militants, saying the United States would “find and bring to justice the terrorists who are responsible.”

Mueller’s family also said in a statement that they were “heartbroken” to learn of her death and released a copy of a letter she had written in 2014 while in captivity.

The comments by Obama and the family come four days after Islamic State said Mueller, a 26-year-old humanitarian worker from Arizona, was killed when Jordanian fighter jets bombed a building where she was being held, although Jordan expressed doubt about the Islamist militant group’s account of her death.

Mueller was determined to have died after her Islamic State captors privately contacted her family over the weekend, a White House spokeswoman said.

“Over the weekend, the family received a private message from Kayla’s ISIL captors containing additional information,” National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said, using an acronym for Islamic State.

“Once this information was authenticated by the intelligence community, they concluded that Kayla was deceased,” Meehan said.

A family representative, who asked not to be identified by name, said the family received a private message from her captors over the weekend containing “additional information, which the intelligence community authenticated and deemed credible.”

Neither Obama nor the family gave details of the circumstances of her death. U.S. officials said that the family received an email and photo from Islamic State that confirmed she was dead.

US officials said they had no evidence to support Islamic State claims that she was killed in a Jordanian air strike, adding the details surrounding her death remained unclear.

“It’s unclear from the intelligence picture how she died,” said one U.S. official, speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity.

Mueller was the last-known American hostage held by Islamic State, which controls wide areas of Syria and Iraq. She was taken hostage while leaving a hospital in the northern Syrian city of Aleppo in August 2013.

The group has beheaded three other Americans, two Britons and two Japanese hostages – most of them aid workers or journalists – in recent months.

“No matter how long it takes, the United States will find and bring to justice the terrorists who are responsible for Kayla’s captivity and death,” Obama said in a statement released by the White House.

“ISIL is a hateful and abhorrent terrorist group whose actions stand in stark contrast to the spirit of people like Kayla,” Obama added.

Even after Islamic State Friday announced her death on Friday, the family had expressed hope that she was still alive.

On Tuesday, her parents and brother issued a statement saying, “Kayla was a compassionate and devoted humanitarian. She dedicated the whole of her young life to helping those in need of freedom, justice and peace.”

The family also released a handwritten letter they said she wrote to them in the spring of 2014 while in captivity. In it, she states that she was “in a safe location, completely unharmed + healthy.”

“I have been shown in darkness, light + have learned that even in prison, one can be free,” the letter states.

“I am not breaking down + I will not give in no matter how long it takes,” the letter states.

U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said in a statement, “The world is united in condemning ISIL’s continued murder and imprisonment of innocents.”

By Constantinos Psillides
EDEK MP Feidias Sarikas dismissed all corruption allegations regarding the Paphos Sewerage Board (SAPA) on Tuesday over the course of five-hours of questioning by police investigators, according to a statement released by his lawyers.
Sarikas, who was the town’s mayor between 1997 and 2006, has been implicated in the case by other suspects. First elected to parliament in 2006, Sarikas is also the chairman of the House Ethics Committee.
The former mayor allegedly received bribes to arrange for a German company to be awarded a contract to build a waste management plant. The accusation came from SAPA manager Eftychios Malekkides, who is currently on trial on corruption charges.
Authorities also questioned Greek professor Giorgos Bafas last week, who according to Malekkides acted as a representative of the German company. Bafas was released after being questioned. Reports said he would be called as a prosecution witness. Police neither denied nor confirmed those reports.
Sarikas visited police headquarters at around 9.30am on Tuesday – according to his lawyers – and handed a statement to investigators and subsequently answered their questions.
“He was very cooperative. He answered every question but thoroughly denied that he had anything to do with the corruption scandal,” a police source told the Cyprus Mail.
Sarikas left police headquarters at around 4pm. Investigators will now go through his statement and coordinate with the office of the Attorney General to decide their next step.
Police investigators have long wanted to question Sarikas but the MP was protected by his parliamentary immunity.
Despite twice publicly pledging that he will waive his immunity, Sarikas refused to do so when he appeared before the Supreme Court in January. The Supreme Court after hearing arguments made by Attorney General Costas Clerides ruled on Monday to lift Sarikas’ immunity.
In its decision, the Supreme Court said that Sarikas maintained a bank account in Greece, which he used to facilitate his dealings with the German company.
The alleged crimes happened between 2000 and 2006.
Police chief Zacharias Chrysostomou assured the public that authorities are doing everything in their power regarding Sarikas. Responding to a question on whether the MP would be arrested, have his bank accounts investigated or be put on the stop list, Chrysostomou replied that “all options are being considered.”
Authorities have so far charged six suspects in connection with the scandal: former Paphos mayor Savvas Vergas, suspended sewerage board director Eftychios Malekkides, former DISY municipal councillor Giorgos Michaelides, former DIKO councillor Efstathios Efstathiou, former AKEL councillor Vasos Vasiliou, and sitting AKEL councillor Giorgos Shailis.
They are facing charges of conspiring to extort money from private contractors, among others.
Vergas and Malekkides, who are expected to plead guilty, are in the process of returning property and cash to the state.

By Kate Holton

Pay-TV group Sky has agreed to pay 4.2 billion pounds to show 126 live English Premier League matches a season from 2016 to 2019, paying well above the expected amount to beat fierce rival BT to the best games.

Following one of the most highly-anticipated broadcast auctions of recent times, the Premier League said Sky had won five of the seven packages of rights, with BT winning the last two. BT will pay 960 million pounds for their three year contract.

“Sky will pay 1.4 billion pounds per annum for each of the three years of the new agreement, representing an 83 per cent increase over the cost of the existing contract,” Sky said.

Combined, the two firms will pay 5.1 billion pounds for the three-year rights deal, well above the 4 billion pounds that analysts had expected and a 68 per cent rise on the 3 billion pounds the two firms paid for the current three-year deal.

After three days of bidding, Sky won the key Sunday afternoon games, while BT will show Saturday evening matches.

The House Education Committee decided on Tuesday not to pursue match fixing claims made by a referee so as not to jeopardise the ongoing police investigation.
The decision was made at the behest of the attorney-general.
Committee chairman Georgios Tasou said they were told “that it would be wise for the committee not to discuss the matter at present but wait for the investigations to conclude”.
Main opposition AKEL MP Andreas Kafkalias said the essence was for the investigation to continue and reach as far as they have to.
Referee Marios Panayi claimed last December that high ranking football association officials were involved in match fixing.
Panayi named CFA deputy head Giorgos Koumas as the man behind the scenes and described chairman Costakis Koutsokoumnis as a “strawman who does what he is told”.
His allegations prompted a police investigation that has thus far culminated in the arrests of former CFA official Michalis Spyrou and the chairman of the referees’ association Michalis Argyrou.
Both Spyrou and Argyrou were remanded for three days and have since been charged in writing and released.

President Nicos Anastasiades has vetoed the parliament’s decision to suspend implementation of tougher foreclosures legislation until March 2, and asked the legislature to heed his call and accept the veto, it emerged on Wednesday.

The veto, dated February 10^h, followed an unofficial visit by the Troika’s Cyprus mission heads last week, during which the Cyprus government made the case that the economy is on the path to recovery.

But a joint statement issued by the three bodies – EU, ECB, and IMF – following the departure of the delegates said that unless foreclosure legislation was fully implemented, a proper review cannot be conducted, and, consequently, no further bailout loan tranches can be released.

Anastasiades reminded deputies that passing the foreclosures bill in December 2014 facilitated the release of €350 million of bailout money from the European Union, but the ensuing suspension froze the release of a further €85 million from the International Monetary Fund.

He added that suspending implementation of the foreclosures law hurts the country’s credibility, and noted that foreclosures cannot be completed at this point since the relevant regulations have not been voted.