Quantcast
Channel: Cyprus Mail
Viewing all 6907 articles
Browse latest View live

Hospital workers go on strike

0
0
CM photo archive

HOSPITAL cleaners staged an impromptu 24-hour strike on Friday in protest against severe understaffing that affected patient care and raised the risk of the spread of infectious diseases.

The strike affected the general and Makarios hospitals in Nicosia, and general hospitals in Paphos and Limassol.

The action included cleaners, ward assistants and laundry services.

Workers said they would not become accomplices to the unacceptable and continuous downgrading of state hospitals.

Workers want vacant positions to be filled in all hospitals either by recruiting or through transfers from other departments. A third option would be to hire seasonal staff, the unions said.

The Health ministry expressed regret over the strike and any inconvenience it may have caused to patients.

The ministry said the strike was unjustified as solutions were in the pipeline.

The Finance ministry has already approved hiring staff to fill vacant positions as per the terms of the bailout – one for every four retirements, a statement said.

Efforts were also underway to transfer seasonal staff from other departments, the ministry added.

Send to Kindle

MPs set up ad hoc group to delve into CY past

0
0
Cyprus Airways ad hoc committee chairman Nicos Tornaritis (photo Christos Theodorides)

By Constantinos Psillides

THE ad hoc committee tasked with discerning the reasons why Cyprus Airways went bankrupt met for the first time on Friday, with committee chairman Nicos Tornaritis pledging that if any criminal liability is uncovered then the Attorney General would be notified immediately.

“Our goal is not to turn the parliament into a people’s court. We will work together with the office of the Attorney General as well as all other stakeholders, under full transparency,” said the DISY MP.

The parliament decided on January 29 to set up a committee that will look into reasons that led to the shutdown of the former national carrier. Cyprus Airways was grounded on January 9 after the European Commission ruled that a multi-million state aid package the company received in 2012 was in violation of EU competition laws. The company was ordered to return €66m to the state and as it was unable to comply, it was forced to shut down.

Closing down the airline left around 500 people out of work and sparked protests outside parliament and the Finance ministry. The employees accuse Finance minister Harris Georgiades of not fighting for the company and facilitating the bankruptcy so as to serve the interests of its competitors. Both the state and the minister have repeatedly dismissed these allegations, citing chronic mismanagement and misappropriation of funds as the reason why the company was forced into closure.

The ad hoc committee chairman said the MPs will dig as far back as 1980 explaining that this was the year the airline’s board decided to start expanding its fleet.

“This is going to be a difficult task and we are going to need a lot of support. There are numerous reports, studies, board decisions and accounts we have to go through. But we will do what we must to get to the truth,” promised Tornaritis.

Opposition AKEL MP Yiannos Lamaris will serve as deputy chairman. Fellow AKEL MPs Stavros Evagorou and Pambos Papageorgiou will also be part of the committee, along with DISY MPs Marios Mavrides and Rikkos Mappourides, DIKO MPs Angelos Votsis and Antonis Antoniou, EDEK MP Nikos Nikolaides, EVROKO MP Dimitris Syllouris and Green’s MP Yiorgos Perdikis.

Tornaritis noted that during the investigation, former Cyprus Airways managers, board members, auditors and even former ministers will be called in to the meetings that will be held every Wednesday and Friday at 11am.

Next Friday’s meeting will determine who will be the first to testify.

The DISY MP pledged to remain impartial throughout the investigation. “For as long as this committee is in session, I will leave my party hat at the door.”

Evagorou was asked by reporters on a possible conflict of interest, since he served on the Cyprus Airways board in the past. The AKEL MP said that his term was a short one and that he will recuse himself from the investigation when it is time to look into the company’s dealings while he was member.

This is not the first time parliament has tried to look into CY’s dealings. In 2002 the Finance Committee also set up an ad hoc committee with a similar mandate but no definite conclusions were reached.

Send to Kindle

Leonard Nimoy, Star Trek’s ‘Mr. Spock,’ dies at 83

0
0
spock-old

By Will Dunham

Leonard Nimoy, famed for his portrayal of Mr. Spock on the “Star Trek” science fiction TV series and movies, has died after battling chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the New York times reported on Friday. He was 83.

The paper, citing confirmation from his wife, Susan Bay Nimoy, said Nimoy, who had grappled with a love-hate relationship for his logical human-alien screen self, died Friday morning at his Los Angeles home.

Last year, Nimoy disclosed on Twitter that he had been diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a progressive lung disease such as emphysema or chronic bronchitis.

“I quit smoking 30 years ago. Not soon enough,” he tweeted to his 810,000 followers. “Grandpa says, quit now!!”

Nimoy had other roles during a long career in TV, film and theater, and directed successful movies, wrote books, composed poetry, published photographs and recorded music. But he will be forever linked to the half-Vulcan, half-human Spock in the original 1960s “Star Trek” TV series and subsequent movies.

Known for suppressing his emotions and using strict logic to guide his actions, Spock became one of the best-known and most beloved sci-fi characters of the late 20th century.

For years, Nimoy resented that Spock defined him but came to accept that his life would be intertwined with the alien who inspired a fervent fan following for “Star Trek.”

Nimoy had often battled “Star Trek” creators during the original series over their conception of Spock, and his input was responsible for developing many aspects of the character.

He came up with the Vulcan nerve grip that rendered foes unconscious, as well as the split-fingered Vulcan “live long and prosper” salute, which he said was inspired by a gesture he had seen worshippers make in his synagogue when he was a boy.

Nimoy signed off his tweets with “LLAP,” an abbreviation of Spock’s trademark phrase “live long and prosper.”(Reuters)

Send to Kindle

13 dogs killed in ‘inhuman’ way (updated)

0
0
Archive photo

British bases police (SBA) are investigating the killing of 13 dogs belonging to a single owner in the Famagusta area, it emerged on Friday.

The killing was reported by the owner who told SBA police in Dhekelia that his dogs, located at his farm in Dasaki Akhnas, had been killed between Thursday afternoon and 8.30am on Friday.

The animals — of various breeds — were killed in an “inhuman” way a police source said. But the perpetrator or perpetrators had not used a firearm, the source added without elaborating.

The Animal Party said later that the dogs had been killed using a special tool used in slaughterhouses. It is understood that the party was referring to a captive bolt pistol, used to stun animals before slaughter.

“In this case the murderers simply used it to kill the dogs,” the party said.

The party said it had contacted the owner who was angry and very sad.

“He told us that he could quarrel with his wife but he would never get angry with his beloved dogs and would never hurt them,” the party said.

SBA police have no suspects so far.

The dogs are said to be worth around €30,000.

The man had been the target of a similar attack in the past, losing one dog at the time.

The incident is the latest in a string of animal killings in the past few months the party said.

It urged the state to “take drastic measures because it is now a social problem that may have to be dealt with by sociologists and psychologists.”

Send to Kindle

Limassol pledges to fix shortfalls in disabled access

0
0
Uneven pavements - a typical example of the mobility problems faced  by wheelchair users

ALL public spaces need to gradually become accessible to the disabled Limassol mayor Andreas Christou said on Friday, explaining that his municipality is setting up the right infrastructure to reach the goal to help the mobility of disabled people around all parts of town.

Christou told CNA that he and the town hall have taken into consideration the observations of the architects association’s municipal councillor Miltos Papadopoulou that access and mobility infrastructure for the disabled in Limassol is almost non-existent.

The architects and the committee for accessible tourism prepared a report released on Thursday that said that access to Limassol public buildings for the disabled is difficult, noting absence of ramps or one that don’t meet standards, lifts are rare and toilets for the disabled are inaccessible and inappropriate.

For their research, the team visited the Limassol police headquarters and traffic police, District offices, the town hall, the old hospital, the tax revenue department and the municipal garden.

Christou said that the town hall has an elevator and that even though no complaints have been made, they will adjust the ramp at the entrance of the building, as noted in the observations, and that they will also look into constructing a toilet.
“A study is needed for these projects but also a lot of money,” Christou said.

He added that the town hall is a listed building and that any interventions must be made carefully and based on relevant regulations.

All new projects in Limassol are obliged include infrastructure to facilitate the disabled, Christou said, and the municipality is willing to review any proposals and take the necessary measures within its means.

Send to Kindle

12 member states miss EU energy grid targets

0
0
electricity grid

CYPRUS, along with 11 other member states, does not meet the EU’s minimum interconnection target of having at least 10 per cent of installed electricity production capable of crossing borders.

The European Commission had earlier this week outlined its ambition to create an Energy Union, part of which would be the 10 per cent electricity interconnection target.

The bloc has pledged that during the upcoming climate summit in Paris, changes are expected to be hammered out.

An informal briefing was held on Friday at EU House in Nicosia, organised by the European Commission Representation in Cyprus, the French Embassy and the ministry of energy, in order to provide an outline of EU objectives and national priorities.

Although member states are required to have at least 10 per cent of their installed electricity production capacity capable of crossing borders by 2020, Cyprus, Estonia, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain and the United Kingdom look set to miss the target.

According to George Markopouliotis, the Head of the Representation in Cyprus said the Commission has drawn up a list of 137 electricity projects, including 35 aimed at electricity interconnection.

The project involving Cyprus would be the ‘EuroAsia Interconnector’ that aims to connect power grids in Cyprus with Israel and Greece.

Such projects are able to benefit from access to financial support of a total of €5.85bn from the ‘Connecting Europe’ facility and, according to Markopouliotis, the first round of funding, worth €647m, includes the leg of the ‘EuroAsia Interconnector’ project foreseeing the link between Hadera in Israel and Vassilikos in Cyprus.

The project has been allocated €1.3m for the production of a feasibility study, while two more Cypriot projects figure in the list, comprising the electricity interconnection of Cyprus and Crete and a set of gas projects, including the proposed pipeline and the LNG storage facility in Vassilikos.

Markopouliotis said that such deals have to be compatible with EU law.

Constantinos Xichilos, the Acting Director for Energy at the ministry, presented preliminary positions on the Energy Union package and said that Nicosia endorsed the Commission’s vision for a resilient Energy Union with a forward looking climate policy.

On electricity interconnection, he said none had been developed yet due to various obstacles, but did not specify.

French ambassador Jean-Luc Florent said that his embassy, along with Cypriot and EU institutions and civil society, would be launching an awareness campaign and mobilising Cyprus ahead of the Paris summit, which takes place in November and December.

He said the support of EU institutions and member-states would be critical. “This is why also in Nicosia we plan to act, with Cypriot and EU institutions and civil society, to raise awareness and mobilise,” he said.

A series of events, notably scientific conferences, will be organised throughout the year to contribute to Cypriot debates, “because Cyprus is also concerned about climate change”, the ambassador said. (CNA)

Send to Kindle

No refund for Peyia and Tala sewerage tax

0
0
Sewerage and road works in Paphos

By Bejay Browne

RESIDENTS of Peyia and Tala in Paphos will not be refunded money already paid into the town’s sewerage scheme in an about-face by the board which is now headed up by the new Paphos mayor.

Earlier this year, the interior ministry turned down requests by both villages to exit the scandal-hit Paphos sewerage board (SAPA) project, which brought down disgraced former mayor Savvas Vergas. However, they were granted a five-year tax freeze and those who have already paid their bills were told they would be refunded.

This decision has now been overturned due to a number of legalities, as returning the money could be like ‘opening a can of worms’, according to SAPA board member and Paphos councillor Andreas Chrysanthou.

He explained that neither community has been removed from the project, only postponing tax collection for five years, so this doesn’t mean that they are relieved from this tax. He added that for accounting reasons, people remain on the system and will be billed for taxes, although it isn’t currently collected.

“If someone wants to sell a property, the title deed must be clear of any taxes and sewerage is a form of tax. The title must be clean and paid-up in order to transfer the deed. If we gave back the money to the original owner and the new owner wants to sell they will have a problem.”

Chrysanthou noted that sewerage taxes already collected from both areas already amount to around €380,000. The sewerage bills are based on the value of the properties. The ministry had initially said that the amount to be returned was around €35,000.

The money, he stressed, is ‘safe’ and is being held in an account and there may be a decision to return it in the near future if all of the legalities and red tape can be bypassed.

“The government misinformed people about returning the funds during the time of former mayor Savvas Vergas and ex sewerage board head Eftichios Malekkides. The minister of the interior may have recommended that the money is returned but it’s up to the board if we do so.”

The SAPA board member, which is now headed up by the town’s new mayor Phedonas Phedonos, also said that if the taxes already collected were returned, they would need to charge both Peyia and Tala for their proportion of studies which have been carried out in relation to their part in the project.

He noted, however, that the situation would be far easier and clear cut if they were both completely out of SAPA, and that the money would be returned with no problem.

“As an engineer myself, as well as a councillor, I believe that neither Tala or Peyia should be part of SAPA, they should have their own sewerage system. I believe a feasibility study noted the same thing. It’s not sensible or economic to send waste from St. Georges in Peyia for example, to Achelia where the treatment plant is. This is around 30-35 km of piping.”

Any delays beyond the revised deadline of 2016 could leave Peyia and Tala liable to huge EU fines.

Send to Kindle

Whips, chains and capitalism: What Fifty Shades of Grey is really about

0
0
comment Fifty Shades of Grey

By Lynn Stuart Parramore

Author EL James has often insisted that Fifty Shades of Grey is wildly popular not because of its titillating trappings of transgression, but because it tells a simple love story for the ages. But this is a romance for a particular kind of age – a time of growing inequality. The social order is breaking up and leaving massive human wreckage in its wake. Dreams of love turn into fantasies of power – who has it and what they can do to those who don’t have it.

When security vanishes and social bonds break down, fictional characters enter the new (ab)normal, which can often involve whips, chains and men in expensive suits with mysterious smiles. The film version of the first book of Fifty Shades is less a shout against the torment than a whimper – or, to be more precise, a lovesick giggle.

Other ages with pronounced power inequities have given rise to vivid sadomasochistic fantasies, such as the late-18th-century novels of the populist-minded Marquis de Sade, whose tales of pain and bondage resonated during a time when the French propertied classes had their boots firmly on the necks of the proletariat. Dreams of transgression become fantasies of liberation from brutal socioeconomic forces.

Our own age of inequality began in the 1970s, when power-hungry capitalists began to attack the New Deal, which had protected ordinary citizens from predatory elites. On cue, sadomasochism showed up at the box office in 1975 with an adaptation of The Story of O, in which a woman is trained in sexual submission when she joins the staff of an elite club.

In 1980, the year that union-busting President Ronald Reagan won the White House, viewers channelled sadomasochist revenge fantasies in Nine to Five, where three working women apply chains and a ball-gag to their tyrannical boss. By 1986, as financial deregulation unleashed Wall Street, we got 9½ Weeks, which introduced a new stock figure: the vaguely sadistic financier who seduces and abuses a woman of modest means.

More recently, Roman Polanski’s 2013 film of David Ives’ hit play Venus in Fur, based on the 19th novel by Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, portrayed a lower-class actress who degrades and dominates an elitist playwright.

Back and forth the stories go. Do you beat the elites (literally) or join them?

In Fifty Shades, the answer is: Join them. The film is the dispiriting denouement of this late stage of capitalism, where cruel conditions are accepted and you learn to suffer the whims of the rich – and pretend to like it.

Under the rules of this cruel regime, the education of sensitive English lit major Anastasia Steele begins when she interviews billionaire Christian Grey in the sumptuous Seattle headquarters of his global empire.

When interviewee queries the ingénue on her plans after college, Anastasia mumbles that she really has no idea. After all, what could her literary studies possibly have to do with this sleek glass command centre for mysterious market forces, where perfectly coifed, robotic women serve their overlord in stilettos? When Christian informs Anastasia that his firm has an internship programme, she glances around doubtfully. “I don’t think I’d fit in.”

Oh, you’ll fit in just fine, Christian’s faint smile seems to say.

She’ll fit right in so long as she gives up her autonomy and agrees to a contract in which he is the master and she is the slave. In lieu of an internship, Christian offers her the starring role of sexual submissive to his dominant.

The price of admission to the world of the dashing entrepreneur is the willingness to be spanked and cuffed, along with the acceptance of his dictates on everything from what to eat to which gynaecologist will inspect Anastasia’s genitals. In exchange, Christian will arbitrarily dispense various goodies: a new car, couture dresses and private helicopter rides. Exactly 15 women have occupied the position before Anastasia, presumably discarded once the game grew dull. (Hopefully they got to keep the clothes).

A sensitive English major, it turns out, will make a fine submissive. Notably, Anastasia is a fan of Thomas Hardy, whose 19th-century tale of a peasantry wrecked by industrialisation, Tess of the d’Urbervilles, presents a poor and inexperienced woman who dreams of a better life, for which presumption she is raped by her wealthy libertine employer. Christian will send our young heroine a first edition of the novel as a gift. A blueprint?

“There are some people who say I don’t have a heart,” admits Christian. “Because they know me.”

Yes, we do know Christian – even if Anastasia doesn’t quite get it. We understand by now that in this unwitting parable of the globalised economy, you hand over your life to the one with the money, and he screws you – perhaps even gently at first. But later, he’s sure to break out the cat o’ nine tails.

When the prospects of ordinary people grow dim and social mobility declines, dreams begin to alter and diminish. In the 19th-century tales of Jane Austen, characters with severely restricted possibilities of bettering their situation had to focus on marrying up as the only way out. Today, it looks like we are returning to that paradigm. Anastasia forgoes an internship, which would probably lead to nothing more than a spot on the squad of stilettoed underlings, in favour of winning the hand of the dark prince and turning him from his nasty ways.

Is it any wonder that this is the fantasy of millions of American women? Why wouldn’t those shackled by low-paying jobs, bonded to childrearing with little social support and lacking possibilities for advancement and consumption become seduced by the dream of access to limitless supplies of money and the leisure time in which to explore kinky sex?

Why would they not want to be carried aloft in helicopters over the drudgery of professional and domestic life? To be distracted by mild titillations in which pain becomes pleasurable and shackles magically liberate?

Because the Fifty Shades trilogy is, at its core, a conventional romance, Cinderella will eventually get to live out the traditional feminine narrative of getting married and having kids with the billionaire-prince. (We’ll have to wait for two more movie installments for that resolution.)

But this fantasy requires a blindfold. You have to pretend that the overlord will have a miraculous change of heart. You have to unlearn the rule of late-stage capitalism: Satisfaction is never guaranteed.

Unless, of course, you happen to be on top.

 

Lynn Stuart Parramore is a contributing editor at AlterNet, co-founder of Recessionwire and founding editor of New Deal 2.0 and IgoUgo.com. The opinions expressed here are her own

Send to Kindle

Playing to the gallery

0
0
Expect increased hardship in Greece

By Hermes Solomon

Success can be like a passing cloud; one minute you see it and the next you don’t…

Appealing to spectators (readers) for maximum approval as in, ‘He peppers his performance with humour and wisecracks, clearly playing to the gallery’ is commonplace in today’s media; ‘…to the gallery’ referring to the cheapest seats in a British theatre and hence, the least sophisticated audience of the late 1800s.

Commentators, journalists and politicians invest time writing and saying things that will make people admire or support them rather than dealing with important issues, more interested in playing to the gallery than exercising real influence on world events.

The power of the media today has never been greater. SYRIZA’s battle in support of its aims is a gift horse of publishing ‘newsworthiness’ for as long as SYRIZA’s cloud can be seen.

Let’s admit it; we were spellbound by SYRIZA’s success five weeks ago. Alexis Tsipras et al became working class heroes overnight. Secretly, we wanted them to succeed in attaining their goals – which were what exactly? And there’s the rub.

It’s only natural that impoverished voters support the hand that professes it will feed them. January’s election victory made SYRIZA a household name, furnishing thousands of pages of print hungry for a David/Goliath confrontation, Good versus Evil – or so a mostly pro-SYRIZA press back then led us to believe.

What interests me in this past five week long media charade is why Brussels even allowed SYRIZA breathing space – given Greece’s unimaginable debts and SYRIZA’s ‘outrageous’ demands – press ‘umpires’ should have cried ‘no contest’ at the outset.

But they let it roll because SYRIZA’s dream sold hope for the poor, dreams that sell papers and hike stock markets, give central bankers time to ‘resettle in the saddle’ and institutions respite from the collapse of confidence that is quietly undermining the European Union, ECB and IMF.

We are at last questioning the validity of austerity – institutionalised leeching. Even president of the European Commission, Jean Claude Juncker admitted that ‘the institutions’ had made many ‘serious’ mistakes dealing with Greece.

Are those same institutions making the same mistakes dealing with Cyprus – provoking our government’s recent trip to Moscow in search of investment and growth contrary to EU/US sanctions? Whether we like it or not, Russia is a major player for Cyprus.

Brussels hates uncertainty or radical change in the status quo.

SYRIZA will first be pacified rather than destroyed outright, and Brussels will take every precaution not to be blamed for this ‘upstart’s’ fall from grace in the eyes of EU voters, lest outrage ensues. And that’s the challenge.

We live in a world of sophisticated press releases. Wording is everything, and nobody knows that better than Yanis Varoufakis, who challenged Brussels to a duel of words: Wulfie insists, ‘We want our pound of flesh,’ and Yanis retorts, ‘Try this!’

Yanis believes the pen is mightier than the sword. He believes his command of economics equal to that of the hundreds of ‘silent’ economists in the pay of Brussels. You’ve got to admire the goy’s chutzpah! And he’s certainly got style, unlike his boss, Alexis, who seems to actually believe in what he popularises – save the poor.

There are more words in a face than any article can write – no contest! And nowadays, there’s much in the sound of a voice and the manner in which words are spoken.

Yanis has the gift of the gab, verve that is contemptuous of unelected authority magnified by good looks and macho male model posturing.

On the other hand, Alexis, with his un-peppered speeches and forthright convictions, plays directly to the stalls, since few are seated in the gallery – hollow sounds of an empty gallery spelling disaster for the speaker.

SYRIZA needs friends in Brussels – Italy, Spain, Ireland, Portugal and Cyprus – but most were silenced by EU mandarins and Yanis now stands alone with Iglesias, leader of Spain’s far left, Podemos, and of all people, our president who, to the disdain of Washington and Brussels, came clean in Moscow.

Opposition parties are waiting to take back their seats of power and return Greece along its former inglorious path – not that SYRIZA will accomplish much in the meantime.

Yanis will receive crumbs, scraps, nothing at all really from Brussels in response to his ‘vague’ demands. He will be strung along at a snail’s pace, baited and parried, hailed or reviled for four months until defeat seems inevitable and SYRIZA inclines gracefully as ‘institutions’ furtively turn the screw even tighter.

Just what was this past five weeks’ hullaballoo all about? For Yanis it was about highlighting the fallibility of those mandarins who, this past five years, have kept most of Europe in recession until ECB chairman, Mario Draghi finally decided to print Europe’s only way out. And quantative easing is merely a temporary stay of execution.

Should SYRIZA fail to fulfil any of their election promises, the media and electorate will hound them out of the ‘house’. But they will be remembered for challenging the merciless usury of Brussels.

SYRIZA’s ‘outrageousness’ will be followed sooner than we think by those other ‘least sophisticated’, who have already anticipated the ‘real’ outcome of the four month SYRIZA/Brussels list of ‘reforms’ – increased hardship for the ‘unqualified’ masses while unemployable post-grads quit Greece and Spain in their hundreds of thousands.

Greedy institutions have disunited the European Union. As the euro falls daily in value against major world currencies, all Eurozone member states are being subjected to the equivalent of a bail-in.

Why even talk about Grexit, Cyexit or Spexit when devaluation of the euro is already well underway? Stop sneering at Greece – nous sommes tous des Grecs!

Send to Kindle

Let us return to the past, it will be a step forward

0
0
Rauf Denktash and Glafcos Clerides were both members of the inter-communal establishment

By Alper Ali Riza

Shortly before she died, my mother famously told a journalist who had impertinently asked her how she came to marry a Turkish Cypriot that by the time she realised my father was Turkish it was too late! She had fallen in love and according to the Ancient Greeks, whose sayings my mother loved to quote, love is invincible! In plain English love conquers all!

I confess that when I first heard of her reminiscence, I was mildly annoyed and took her to task over the implication of her remark which, as it seemed to me, was that had she realised he was Turkish earlier on she would have held back. But when she explained her comment in the context of the nature of courting in Limassol in the 1940s, I found her explanation compelling.

She said that in those days in Limassol and, it has to be said to avoid inter-city rivalry, Larnaca also, romantic relationships blossomed on the promenade and pier which provided a balmy romantic setting for young women to meet young men and fall in love. She explained how my father had mingled socially so imperceptibly with his Greek Cypriot friends as he strolled up and down the promenade that she assumed he was Greek Cypriot. And as every ardent lover of that generation knows, falling in love in those days was a visual experience to begin with. One could fall in love by looks and furtive glances with someone for whom one felt a mutual love interest.

Marriage across ethnicity did not flourish in Cyprus. It did in Sarajevo in Bosnia where apparently it formed twenty five per cent of relationships, even though it made no difference to the ethnic violence of the 1990s in former Yugoslavia. But friendships did flourish in Cyprus at various levels before the start of the Cyprus problem in 1955. Importantly, there were strong friendships between Greek and Turkish Cypriots amongst well-connected prominent persons who wielded power and influence who thought alike and wished Cyprus well.

British colonial rule was not ideal. Indeed from 1931 onwards Cyprus was run by executive diktat from Government House. But the rule of law prevailed and the British encouraged the formation of an inter-communal Cypriot establishment at the forefront of which were the English School in Nicosia and the Inns of Court in London.

It was a journalist called Henry Fairlie in an article in the Spectator Magazine in 1955 who coined the use of the word establishment to identify the informal institution we know today. He defined it as “not only the centres of official power – though they are certainly part of it – but rather the whole matrix of official and social relations within which power is exercised. The exercise of power in Britain cannot be understood unless it is recognised that it is exercised socially.”

Cyprus had an inter-communal establishment. Its best known members were Glafcos Clerides and Rauf Denktash, although they would deny it if they were still with us. But both were products of the Inns of Court and Rauf Denktash was not only an English School Old Boy he was also very active in the parents’ association. Just before the 1974 war these two former members of the colonial establishment reached an accommodation on the Cyprus problem precisely because they had come from the same stable so to say.

The English School is still there although a shadow of its former self. Instead of being a source of inter-communal friendship, it is a source of inter-communal friction. I was only there for a couple of years in the 1960s. My first love has always been its rival, the American Academy in Larnaca, yet I am saddened by the fact that narrow-minded nationalists have taken over the Old School. Alas, it is symptomatic of the spirit of the times in Cyprus.

There are few real friendships between Greek and Turkish Cypriots these days. With the exception of my best friend from my English School days who spends more time on the Turkish side than any other Greek Cypriot, and who rejoices in his Turkish Cypriot friendships, most Cypriots take the Cyprus problem personally: They take it so personally it impedes their ability to form and sustain friendships across the green line.

It has been possible to move across the green line since 2003, but people do not engage with each other socially. There are a few exceptions from the academic world but there is no “matrix of official and social relations”.

There is no reason why this should be so except that people from each side believe their own propaganda. Time was when Turkish Cypriots like my father and his friend Judge Vedad Dervish, and apparently even Rauf Denktash himself, dined and sang and danced in Limassol to the songs of Sofia Vembo and Nicos Gounaris. As Verdi once said to his music students: “Let us return to the past, it will be a mild step forward!” The time has come to shake off prejudices and preconceived ideas of the present. It is possible to differ about the Cyprus problem and still be very good friends.

I end where I began. My mother married a Turkish Cypriot but remained fiercely patriotic about being Greek. Likewise my father was a fervent admirer of Kemal Ataturk and wished to be buried in a Turkish cemetery even though in life he did my mother the favour of not moving to northern Cyprus. His wish was fulfilled. He is buried in a Turkish cemetery in Pyla, which is the only place that remained together, although even in Pyla there are two coffee houses, one Turkish and one Greek, which means the two socialise apart.

My parents had a long and happy marriage. I do not remember them having a single serious argument, least of all about the Cyprus problem. Not even when my father found out that my mother had secretly christened me behind his back, which he laughed off as feminine guile rather than Byzantine intrigue. He was right since what matters is what happens as a matter of choice. I am as much a secular Kemalist as my father was.


Alper Ali Riza is a Queen’s Counsel and one of HM part time judges in England

Send to Kindle

Bankrupt magicians have no dignity worth defending

0
0
Preserving the dignity of Alexis Tsipras' leadership

By Loucas Charalambous

WHEN GREECE entered the eurozone on January 1, 2001, some analysts were taken by surprise. They all wondered how this country had managed to improve its finances so much that it could suddenly meet the targets set by the Maastricht guideline, the precondition for entry into the eurozone.

Especially strange was the staggering reduction of the budget deficit to 1.5 per cent of GDP which was well below the Maastricht limit of three per cent. What had happened, how had this miracle materialised? The truth emerged much later. The economy was in a terrible mess, as analysts had suspected, but the smart guys of PASOK had cooked the books.

Eleven years later on an Allan Little BBC show in 2012, a Greek national working in London for Salomon Brothers revealed what had happened: “I frequently visited Athens with clients. There, we always saw the head of the Statistical Service which produced all the data on the public debt, deficit, inflation etc. He was the magician who made the deficit and inflation disappear. Greece cooked the books in order to enter the eurozone.

“But how did the magic work? Take for instance the state railway company OSE. It has a loss of a billion euros every year. It had more employees than passengers. A former minister Stefanos Manos had publicly said that ‘it would cost us less if we sent them all by taxi.’ The authorities used a magic trick to make the problem disappear. The railway company issued shares which were bought by the state, so its deficit was not listed as an expense but as a book-keeping entry (its loss was turned into capital). It never showed as an expense in the budget.”

With these magic tricks Greece satisfied the Maastricht criteria and entered the eurozone in 2001. The deception was revealed in 2004. In March of that year a new government was elected and Petros Doukas was appointed minister for the budget. This was what he said:

“I invited the senior staff of the ministry and asked them to give me details about the budget that that had been approved the previous December, two-and-a-half months before we took office. I told them: ‘Do not worry about being prosecuted, just tell me the truth.’ The difference between the announced budget deficit and the real one was huge. In the state budget it was listed as 1.5 per cent but in reality it was 8.3 per cent of GDP. I told them: ‘We must start checking the budget’ and the answer I received was the following: ‘Look, we have the Olympic Games in a few months and we cannot anger the people and push them into calling strikes just before the Games’.”

The scams were hushed up and Greece carried on borrowing money, and at the very low interest rates Germany was paying. And eventually we arrived at 2010 when the colossal scale of the problem was revealed and the country had to be bailed out.

The above is dedicated to the political demagogues and our super-patriotic journalists in Athens and Cyprus, who, instead of feeling ashamed, as I do, about this disgraceful business by the ‘mother country’ have put on the national costume and are trumpeting about the ‘struggle for Greece’s dignity’ under the leadership of Alexis Tsipras. They forget that bankrupt magicians, unfortunately, have no dignity that needs defending.

I would also like to dedicate this to our own Erato Kozakou-Markoulli, who has been enchanted by the new wizard of the Greek economy, Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis, whom she wants to clone, presumably so she could bring his copy to Cyprus.

As some might say that Tsipras, Varoufakis and SYRIZA were not to blame for the government shenanigans that bankrupted the country, we should remind everyone that the dirty wing of PASOK with all its political crooks moved en masse to SYRIZA in the expectation that the big party of the Andreas Papandreou years would be revived.

Their mistake is that they have not realised that the magic tricks no longer work and that there is a Troika, now known as the institutions, that does not give out billion as in the past but want to know where every euro is spent.

Send to Kindle

Tales from the Coffeeshop: How to explain Nik’s Putin pandering?

0
0
Πρόεδρική Κατοικια της Ρωσικής Ομο

By Patroclos

SEVERAL regulars at our establishment have been wondering whether Prez Nik’s daughters have left the family law office, now their father has nothing to do with it any longer, and opened a PR firm which landed a multi-million contract to handle the publicity of Vladimir Putin.

Watching and hearing Nik acting like Putin’s personal PR man in this week’s triumphant visit to Mother Russia, you might have thought that, being the good father that he is, he has been helping his daughters’ new business get off the ground. Only a PR man, making big bucks, would have willingly made such a complete fool of himself, publicly flattering a ruthless tyrant.

Yet the truth is that the prez’s daughters have not opened a PR business and Nik had no financial or personal incentive to grovel to Putin in the embarrassing way we all witnessed on our TV screens. Did he feel so grateful and honoured for receiving an invitation to Moscow from the great leader that he considered it appropriate to behave like the over-awed ambassador of the satellite republic of Arslikhan?

As Nik told everyone, Putin was a “leader of integrity”. He expressed “limitless respect for President Putin, who knows all about the problems for Cyprus (an ironic dig at the evil West), but did not ask for anything that would put us in a difficult position either with our partners in the EU or our allies across the Atlantic.”

Why would he ask for anything else Nik? He was satisfied that he got a naive leader of an EU member state – even as unimportant as Kyproulla – to visit Russia at a time when the EU is supposedly united against his aggression and expansionism in eastern Ukraine.

Nik does not think deeply enough to realise that he was being used just so this “leader of integrity” could score a small victory over the EU.

WE ALSO heard about Russia’s principled stand on the Cyprob for the zillionth time and were informed by Nik about the “mutual understanding” between the two countries which supported “each other on all issues but primarily on the Cyprus issue, the economy and the Ukrainian crisis.”

Does this mean we supported the invasion and annexation of Crimea? If we did, we should not have been going on about the Turkish occupation for the last 40 years because someone might accuse us of having the double standards we love to accuse the Yanks and Brits of displaying when they do not take a stand on principle on the Cyprob, like Mother Russia does.

As for the war in eastern Ukraine, Russia has nothing to do with it according to our prez, and the EU was unfair to impose sanctions just because “it suspected Russia was encouraging the separatists.” Putin may have provided the separatists with tanks, missiles, heavy artillery and military training, but to claim that he was encouraging them when none of the EU leaders had actually heard him doing so was grossly unfair.

At least Putin has Nik in the EU to look after his interests. “We contributed so that the sanctions were milder,” our prez bragged at a news conference he gave at Tass news agency on Thursday. And in case any of our EU partners suspected Nik of acting like a Russian agent he decided to come clean, declaring: “Cyprus is the most trustworthy voice for Russia inside the EU.”

THIS WAS no idle talk aimed at pleasing his primarily Russian audience. A few months ago he had invited a group of political correspondents to the presidential palace to give them a briefing about the political situation and win them over.

One of the hacks accused him of turning his back on Mother Russia and unquestioningly backing EU sanctions. The prez took great offence and said this was an unfair charge. He explained that our representatives at the EU forwarded every document relating to Russia to Moscow as soon as it was issued in Brussels.

He also told the hacks that this bit of information was off the record, someone who was there told the Coffeeshop.

It seems Cyprus is also the most trustworthy set of ears for Russia inside the EU as well. And to think he was impressed because Putin did not ask for anything that would put us in a difficult position with our EU partners. We are giving him such a good service it would have been a bit rude to have asked for anything else, especially from such a leader of integrity.

HAVING rejected the PR company theory as a reason for the loony statements made by Nik during the Russia visit, we decided to explore other possible explanations.

Politis columnist, Costas Constantinou wrote on Friday, that he hoped the prez had been drinking. “I do not know if the president drank too much on the trip to Moscow,” he wrote. “It is one of the rare occasions that I hoped he had. Because if he had not been drinking or was drinking just a little and said all the things he said, then I will start worrying for the future.”

Could he have been obliged to drink vodka, which did not agree with him (Scotch is his preferred beverage) and affected his thought process? I doubt it, because seasoned drinkers can handle all types of alcohol.

Another explanation was that he decided to follow the Makarios diplomacy of the sixties and seventies, when the deluded and naive Archbishop simplistically thought he could play off the East against the West and we ended up losing half of Kyproulla to the Turks as a result.

Fortunately Nik is too impulsive and hot-headed to have a foreign policy plan or a diplomatic strategy. He has shown that he prefers to shape policy on a day-to-day basis, according to how he feels and what the public is demanding.

THE PUTIN-pandering and public worship of Mother Russia was, to an extent, aimed at the domestic audience. For months party leaders and media pundits had been urging Nik to abandon his ‘one-dimensional’ pro-Western foreign policy and strengthen relations with Russia.

AKEL argued he had to pursue a ‘multi-dimensional’ foreign policy – which really meant that Nik should abandon the imperialist West and suck up to the virtuous and principled Putin – and this demand was soon repeated by all the opposition parties. Nik’s foreign policy, as we said, is shaped by public demand.

He fully satisfied the media and the parties all of which issued statements praising his crazy antics in Russia and the restoring of relations with Russia. AKEL was in triumphant mood, saying that the trip signalled the end to the unacceptable dogma that Kyproulla “belongs to the West” and the abandonment of the “one-dimensional character of our foreign policy”.

All the parties adopted the commie rhetoric, DIKO welcoming “the multi-dimensional foreign policy being exercised as it would work in the interests of the country” (the full backing of AKEL and DIKO is proof that Nik’s policy is bad for the country).

It is amazing how the commies of AKEL impose their anti-Western agenda and all parties follow suit. What is amusing is that Nik’s foreign policy will remain one-dimensional now that he has jumped into bed with Putin because the West will probably want nothing to do with him. But that is what AKEL and the Akelites of the other parties always wanted.

ANOTHER plausible explanation for Nik’s Russia antics was that he wanted to get his own back on the US and the EU for their failure to stop, or at least condemn, the violations of the Cypriot EEZ by Turkey. We still remember his angry TV outburst in which he accused everyone of deceiving him from the UN Secretary-General to the US ambassador, whom he stopped speaking to.

The prez felt he had been shafted, especially by the Yanks who had told him they would persuade Turkey not to issue another navtex, so he decided to get even. In retaliation he decided to shaft the West by publicly offering his allegiance to the despised Putin. He is too hot-headed to care about the consequences, satisfied that he got his own back.

It is not very statesman-like way to behave but our prez, to his credit, has never had any such pretension. He is Limassol lawyer from the school of hard knocks who follows the rule of the street – you shaft me, I will shaft you at the first opportunity. It is not the cleverest way to conduct foreign policy, especially when the adversary you think you have shafted is the most powerful country in the world, but Nik doesn’t care because he is from Limassol, the birthplace of tough alpha males.

THE BIG irony is that despite the multi-dimensional brown-nosing of Putin, Kyproulla got nothing in exchange. Nik may have been given a couple of personal gifts but we got nothing, not even a couple of words mildly censuring “Turkey’s invasion of our EEZ”.

The position taken by the Russian Federation on the violations last year was as pro-Turkish as that of the Yanks and the Brits, but we let it pass. We were however informed that during their meeting on Wednesday, Putin showed an interest in the invasion by the Turkish ship Barbaros and the government spokesman showed him pictures of the ship’s invasion that he had on his mobile phone.

“Putin examined the picture for quite some time and asked questions,” a suitably impressed Phil reported. I bet no EU leader has ever asked to see mobile phone pictures of the Barbaros.

MOSCOW’S local cheerleaders all reported that on his arrival in Moscow Nik received a ‘present’ from Russia. The Duma had voted through the restructuring of the €2.5 billion loan that comrade Tof had secured from Russia in 2011.

The repayment period was extended from 2018 to 2022 and the interest was reduced from 4.5 per cent to 2.5 per cent, which is still higher than what the Troika is charging for the money it had lent us. What none of the reports mentioned was that the restructuring was negotiated and agreed back in 2013, just after the haircut, by the European Commissioner for Economic Affairs Olli Rehn.

But if this was mentioned it would have diminished the value of the present.

SORRY if we have bored you by taking up the whole shop dealing with Nik in Russian wonderland, but we promise to resume normal services next week. Sadly we have run out of space to carry out a preview of the EDEK leadership elections that take place today.

It is just as well, because the build-up has been as boring as the speeches of its outgoing leader Omirou. All I can say is that there are two candidates and that one of them, Marinos Sizopoulos, has the backing of the party’s president for life and beyond, Dr Faustus. This is a very good reason to vote for the other guy, Varnavas, who might not dazzle with his in intelligence and wit, but at least he is not from the narcissistic wing of the party.

Send to Kindle

Our View: Russia trip highlighted Anastasiades’ failings

0
0
President Anastasiades and Russian President Putin at their joint press conference

ALL THE SHORTCOMINGS of President Anastasiades as a politician and head of state were displayed during his heralded official visit to Russia. His failure to exercise restraint when speaking publicly, his inclination to allow his emotions to rule his head, his poor judgement and inadequate diplomatic skills, his obsession with his domestic popularity ratings and his inability to see any difference between speaking at a Sunday memorial service in a Cyprus village and in front of an international audience were all evident on his Russia trip.

The more he spoke – and he was given plenty of opportunities to do so – the more he showed himself up, oblivious to the harm he was causing himself and more importantly the country. Anastasiades went out of his way to cause offence to his EU partners whose policies towards Russia he openly criticised while absolving President Putin of any responsibility for the crisis in the Ukraine. Even if he believed that to be true there was no good reason for repeating it in public – worse still, on a visit to the country that has been behind the dispute – as it would not win him any friends in Brussels.

Anastasiades appeared to be on a mission to antagonise the EU and the US during this badly-timed visit. He boasted that he was the first leader of an EU member-state to visit the Russian Federation during “this critical period”, informing journalists the two countries supported each other on all issues, but primarily, on the Cyprus problem, the economy and the Ukraine crisis. He did not openly say whether his government supported the invasion and annexation of Crimea as the matter was not raised, but he felt the EU was wrong to impose sanctions on Russia “on the suspicion Russia encouraged the separatists”.

The Europeans had shown their double standards in this case he said because Russia had not invaded the eastern Ukraine whereas Turkey invaded Cyprus’ EEZ and the EU did not impose sanctions. This simplistic argument may have earned him applause back home – this is the audience he was targeting – but it was insensitive and foolish considering some 5,000 people have been killed and the separatists, using heavy weapons provided by Putin, have reduced eastern Ukraine to rubble forcing more than a million people to flee their homes.

Believing Russian involvement in the Ukraine crisis was just a figment of the imagination of EU leaders, Anastasiades took a stand, with some other countries, against tough sanctions being imposed by the EU. If he had not, sanctions would have been tougher he claimed. “Cyprus is the most trustworthy voice for Russia within the EU,” he declared in a joint news conference with Putin. Again, it seems rather unwise to advertise such a dubious role, even if it sounds good to your hosts. In effect Anastasiades was warning his EU partners and Brussels not to trust him because he was promoting Russia’s interests in the Union.

All these utterances went down very well in Cyprus where the anti-Western demagogues welcomed the supposed restoration of good relations with Moscow and hoped they would be strengthened. But apart from winning the plaudits of his fellow politicians in Cyprus, Anastasiades gained nothing meaningful or practical from his visit to Russia that would benefit Cyprus. Putin, despite his allegedly principled stand on international matters, did not even mention Turkey’s invasion of Cypriot EEZ, let alone issue a mild rebuke of the Turks; he would continue offering support on the Cyprus problem – it was reported – but this would be conditional on not upsetting Turkey.

There was one big negative to the theatre staged in Russia by Putin and in which Anastasiades took a starring role. He will now be regarded a Putin pawn, with ample justification, that none of his fellow-leaders in the EU would trust or take seriously. He paid an official visit at a time when the EU was supposedly united against the Russian role in the Ukraine crisis, giving Putin the opportunity to embarrass Brussels, at least publicity-wise. And worse still, he openly sided with Russia against the EU over the Ukraine when there was no need to do so.

All this, from a president, whose supposed foreign policy objective until a few months ago was to place Cyprus in the Western sphere of influence and try to join NATO. It is now clear that Anastasiades has no long-term goals and foreign policy is shaped by his whims and whatever he believes might improve his popularity rating.

Send to Kindle

Fears Cyprus is ‘breaking ranks’

0
0
The Russian fleet will be able to dock in Cyprus ports under certain conditions

By Angelos Anastasiades

PRESIDENT Nicos Anastasiades’ remarks against EU-imposed sanctions on Russia at a press conference in Moscow were “surprising” and “made no sense”, according to political analysts, as they jeopardise Cyprus’ relations with the EU and the West for not much in return.

Anastasiades, elected president on a pro-West campaign pledge of joining NATO’s Partnership for Peace programme and who spent the first 18 months of his term building a conspicuously strong relationship with the United States, told the world on Thursday that “neither military means, nor sanctions can provide the answer” to the Ukraine issue.

And on Friday, Anastasiades was reported as saying from Saint Petersburg that Cyprus will “cooperate [with Russia] without regard to who reacts or may have other concerns”.

On a four-day official visit to Russia this week, Anastasiades also signed a number of agreements with the Russian Federation, including formalising an existing agreement which allows the Russian fleet access to Cypriot ports for humanitarian purposes, and “combating terrorism, drug-trafficking, and smuggling”.

The agreement was interpreted by some foreign media as creating a “Russian military foothold” and a “beachhead” in the Eastern Mediterranean. The British press, in particular, quoted military and political sources who expressed fears that the agreement would allow Russian vessels to eavesdrop on electronic intelligence gathering from the British Bases.

Many commentators, however, tend to think that it was not so much the agreement as Anastasiades’ subsequent remarks that were cause for alarm in EU and US diplomatic quarters.

“The agreement is fine, there is nothing there to cause friction,” a veteran politician who spoke on condition of anonymity told the Sunday Mail on Saturday. “The main problem is that when [Anastasiades] gets angry, more often than not he can’t control his mouth.”

The source said that the Russia trip was most likely designed as a harmless crowd-pleasing manoeuvre for internal consumption, which suddenly turned sour after the president’s comments at the press conference.

“Whether we like it or not, we are part of the EU. Obviously, we need to be friends with Russia, but we can’t play one power against another. That is recklessly dangerous.” the source said.

“We can’t think that we are bigger than we actually are.”

Another source, a political analyst who also opted for anonymity, said the move was so controversial that some people have wondered whether Anastasiades’ ill health might be clouding his political judgement.

“Doubts over whether the government really is after a solution to the Cyprus problem also started surfacing, and there is also concern regarding the inner workings of the presidential palace – it seems that an inward-looking situation has developed there, which does not allow for much external advice to come in and tends to magnify and reinforce internally-held views,” the source said.

James Ker-Lindsay, senior research fellow on the Politics and International Relations of South East Europe at the London School of Economics and Political Science, was also sceptical of Anastasiades’ move.

“There’s a complex spectre here,” he told the Sunday Mail. “Greek Cypriots have traditionally viewed Russia as a vital ally since the early days of the Republic’s life, and many on the island feel that Russian support at the Security Council has been one of the few things Cyprus could count on. On the other hand, they feel let down by the European Union. And then we have a pro-West president who has expressed disappointment in recent months over things like the United Nations Secretary General’s report on Cyprus, or the stance of the United States.”

“But right now, at a time when questions are being asked across Europe about Russia, other countries look at this development and feel that certain EU partners appear to be breaking ranks – breaking Europe’s united front.”
Though he acknowledged that Cyprus is by no means the only one to side with Russia, citing Greece and Hungary as examples, Ker-Lindsay pointed out that Cyprus could have opted to refrain from stirring diplomatic tensions by remaining neutral on the issue.

“But actively going to Moscow and signing military agreements, and then voicing opposition to sanctions imposed by the EU as a bloc – let’s just say there is concern at the idea that Russia is the great big friend of Cyprus, as opposed to the West,” he said.

Meanwhile, experts have attributed the mostly British concern over the agreement between Russia and Cyprus – as well as Anastasiades’ remarks – to Britain’s traditionally close ties with Cyprus, and perhaps even to their perceived role as US mouthpiece within the EU.

However, Ker-Lindsay felt that reactions from the UK have been blown out of proportion by the local media.
“There has been some media attention – not that much,” he said. “It certainly is a source of concern and annoyance behind the diplomatic scenes, but there is also a sense that a strong reaction could make matters worse.”

Indeed, on Saturday two local hard-line opposition parties – the Citizens’ Alliance, which has long trumpeted its support for closer ties with Russia, and the Greens, which has long adopted harsh anti-British rhetoric – issued statements criticising what they called “Britain’s traditionally subversive approach towards Cyprus”.

“We hope that the president’s improved image is substantiated and remains unaffected by any reactions from our Western strategic allies and their local representatives,” the Citizens’ Alliance said.

“Our European partners maintain a Pontius-Pilate stance towards Cyprus, imposing sanctions on Russia for the Ukraine crisis but ignoring Turkish actions against Cyprus,” the Green party said in a statement.

Send to Kindle

Apollon back at the top

0
0
Apollon's striker Papoulis celebrates his teams opening goal

By Iacovos Constantinou

Apollonas reclaimed top spot in the championship as they defeated Anorthosis by 2-0 while APOEL could only draw against a spirited Omonia. Elsewhere AEK moved into fourth place with a convincing 4-1 thumping of Doxa while all other games, Ethnios-Ermis, Nea Salamina- Ayia Napa and Othellos-AEL ended goalless.

Apollonas had few problems in overcoming a dispirited Anorthosis who were missing a number of key players namely Avraam, Calvo and Laifis

The Limassol team got off to a great start when they were awarded a penalty for handball as early as the 10th minute that their Greek striker Papoulis converted a minute later.

Apollonas controlled play and missed a number of chances to double their score but some wayward finishing and some excellent goalkeeping by Kaminski kept the home side at bay until the last minute when Guie secured the points with a close range strike.

An 82nd thunderbolt from Fofana gave Omonia a deserved point against their fierce local rivals APOEL.

APOEL were the better side in the first half and took the lead on the half hour through Morais who diverted a Charalambides free kick past the Omonia keeper Giorgallides. Lanig had earlier hit the woodwork and Efraim had put the ball into the back of net but the ‘goal’ was correctly disallowed for handball.

In the second half Omonia came out firing on all cylinders and created a host of chances with their goalscorer Fofana hitting the foot of the post from just inside the area and Assis failing to head the ball past APOEL’s keeper Pardo from close range.

Omonia got what they deserved eight minutes from time when Fofana blasted the ball past Pardo after a poor Morais clearance.

Doxa took the lead through Lopo in the 10th minute following a dreadful back pass by AEK’s Catala.

From there on though, AEK’s Brazilian striker Vander took charge, equalizing in the 30th minute and then setting up Nestor Mitides twice to give AEK a two goal cushion. Roberto Colautti wrapped up the scoring with a goal two minutes from time.

No goals were scored in the remaining fixtures leaving the bottom half of the table unchanged.

Nea Salamina were unlucky not to defeat Ayia Napa, missing a number of chances to take all three points.

Ethnikos Achnas also produced a fine diplay against Ermis but could not find a way past Ermis’s keeper Bogadinov and the one time they did the ‘goal’ was (incorrectly) disallowed for offside.

In the final game Othellos and AEL played a poor game with the keepers of both sides never really tested.

NORMAL SEASON FINAL STANDINGS
1. APOLLONAS 48
2. APOEL 46
3. OMONIA 39
4. AEK 39
5. ANORTHOSIS 38
6. ERMIS ARADIPPOU 35
7. AEL 30
8. ETHNIKOS ACHNAS 22
9. NEA SALAMINA 19
10. AYIA NAPA 16
11. OTHELLOS ATHIENOU 16
12. DOXA KATOKOPIAS 14

Send to Kindle

Maduro says Venezuela detains U.S. citizens; announces moves against U.S.

0
0
Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Saturday his government had detained U.S. citizens, including a pilot, on suspicion of espionage, in a move likely to strain already tense relations between Washington and Caracas.

Maduro also said his government would order a reduction in the number of U.S. embassy staff in Caracas and prohibit some U.S. officials from entering Venezuela in retaliation for a similar U.S. measure last year. Venezuela would also require U.S. citizens to obtain visas before visiting, he told a rally.

The Venezuelan president, long at odds with Washington, has renewed accusations in recent weeks that the United States is seeking to topple him.

Maduro’s political opponents at home call this a smokescreen aimed at distracting from an increasingly severe economic crisis in the oil-exporting nation. Venezuela has been hard hit by the collapse of oil prices over the last nine months.

“We have captured some U.S. citizens in undercover activities, espionage, trying to win over people in towns along the Venezuelan coast,” Maduro said at a rally in Caracas adding one was a U.S. pilot detained in the volatile border state of Tachira.

“In Tachira we captured a pilot of a U.S. plane (who is) of Latin origin (carrying) all kinds of documentation,” Maduro said, without offering details.

He said U.S. politicians including former President George W. Bush, former Vice President Dick Cheney, and Senator Bob Menendez would be blocked from entering Venezuela.

Menendez in response said: “Being sanctioned by the Maduro regime will never deter me from speaking out against the ruin caused by his government.”

A spokesman for the U.S. embassy in Caracas said he was unable to comment, citing a lack of any official diplomatic communication with the Venezuelan government.

An official in U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration broadly dismissed the accusations from Caracas.

“The continued allegations that the United States is involved in efforts to destabilize the Venezuelan government are baseless and false,” the senior administration official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

EVANGELICALS QUESTIONED

The head of a Venezuelan evangelical organization said on Friday a group of four missionaries had been called in for questioning after taking part in a medical assistance campaign in the coastal town of Ocumare de la Costa.

That pastor, Abdy Pereira, said on Saturday in a telephone interview that the four had left the country for Aruba after having been questioned for several days about alleged involvement in espionage.

“The government attempted to link them to (espionage activities) but there was no evidence that this was the case,” said Pereira.

The Communication Ministry did not answer calls seeking details about the identities of the missionaries or their whereabouts.

On the move to reduce the U.S. mission in Caracas, Maduro said he had ordered Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez to proceed immediately, based on Vienna convention rules, “to revise, reduce … and limit the number of officials in the U.S. embassy in Venezuela.”

It was not clear when embassy officials would have to leave.

Maduro added that Americans will now need visas to enter Venezuela and will have to pay the same visa fees that Venezuelans pay to get into the United States.

The president’s moves followed the arrest this month of Caracas Mayor Antonio Ledezma on conspiracy charges, a move Maduro said would stymie a U.S.-backed coup effort.

Maduro’s adversaries said the plot was a charade meant to distract from consumer goods shortages, soaring prices and Maduro’s tumbling popularity ratings.

Caracas and Washington have had tense diplomatic relations since the era of late socialist leader Hugo Chavez, who was briefly toppled in a 2002 coup that he said was orchestrated by the State Department.

The government of then U.S. President George W. Bush endorsed that coup before backtracking when Chavez returned to power.

Send to Kindle

U.S.-Israel ties fraying over Netanyahu speech, Iran talks

0
0
U.S. officials are fuming over what they see as an affront by Netanyahu (photo) over Obama's Iran diplomacy ahead of an end-of-March deadline for a framework nuclear agreement

As relations between President Barack Obama and Benjamin Netanyahu hit a new low over the Israeli prime minister’s planned speech to Congress and a looming deadline for a nuclear deal with Iran, there are growing signs it could damage the broader U.S.-Israeli alliance.

Already there has been some fraying of the usually strong relationship amid the frosty personal ties between the two leaders and a deepening divide over the Iran talks, which Israel fears will allow its arch foe to develop an atom bomb.

U.S. officials are fuming over what they see as an affront by Netanyahu over Obama’s Iran diplomacy ahead of an end-of-March deadline for a framework nuclear agreement.

Israeli officials and hard-line U.S. supporters are just as adamant in defending Netanyahu’s right to take center-stage in Washington on Tuesday to sound the alarm over the possible deal.

U.S. and Israeli officials insist that key areas of cooperation from counter-terrorism to intelligence to cyber security have been unaffected and will remain so.

But the rift – shaping up as the worst in decades between the allies due to its partisan nature – could have a real impact in some areas, making it harder for Israel to press concerns directly with senior U.S. officials, for example.

As one former U.S. official put it: “Sure, when Netanyahu calls the White House, Obama will answer. But how fast will he be about responding (to a crisis)?”

U.S. officials last month even went as far as accusing the Israeli government of leaking information to the Israeli media to undermine Iran negotiations and took the unusual step of limiting further sharing of sensitive details about the talks.

The rift is considered potentially far-reaching because it marks a dramatic departure from Israel’s long tradition of carefully navigating between Republicans and Democrats.

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the “politicized” nature of Netanyahu’s visit threatens “what undergirds the strength of the relationship”, though he said there was shared interest in keeping the alliance strong.

People on both sides, including current and former officials, U.S. lawmakers, independent experts and Washington lobbyists, expressed concern about a broader fallout on ties.

At the same time many of them point to the two countries’ history of being able to “compartmentalize” diplomatic disputes to preserve cooperation on other shared priorities.

FRAYING FABRIC OF RELATIONSHIP

There are ways that Obama, whose aides see an Iran nuclear deal as a potential signature achievement for a foreign policy legacy short on major successes, could make his displeasure felt in the final two years of his presidency.

Israelis have long fretted over the possibility that Washington might not be as diligent about shielding Israel at the United Nations and other international organizations.

One Israeli official acknowledged the prospect is now more worrisome when the Palestinians are resorting increasingly to global forums like the International Criminal Court to press grievances against Israel and Europeans are losing patience with Israel over settlement building on occupied land.

Obama also has the option of trying to restart moribund Middle East peace efforts and putting more pressure on Israel for concessions to the Palestinians. Whether he does so could depend partly on the outcome of Israel’s March 17 election, when Netanyahu faces a stiff challenge from the center-left.

Netanyahu is expected to use his speech to urge lawmakers to approve new sanctions against Iran despite Obama’s insistence that such legislation would sabotage nuclear talks and he would veto it. It has driven a rare wedge between his government and some congressional Democrats. Some two dozen or more of them plan to boycott the speech, according to unofficial estimates.

Using strikingly strong language, Obama’s national security adviser Susan Rice called the political partisanship caused by Netanyahu’s coming address “destructive to the fabric of the relationship” with Israel.

“What the prime minister is doing here is simply so egregious that it has a more lasting impact on that fundamental underlying relationship,” said Jeremy Ben-Ami, head of J Street, a liberal pro-Israel lobbying group aligned with Obama’s Iran policy.

Netanyahu, who will address the influential pro-Israel lobby AIPAC on Monday, has remained defiant. Even so, he is expected to try to keep tensions from spiraling.

And no one believes the Obama administration would abandon it should a new military conflict erupt with Hamas in the Gaza Strip or with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

“Let’s not forget the U.S. needs every friend it has in the Middle East,” said Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East negotiator for Democratic and Republican administrations.

Send to Kindle

North Korea, angered by drills, fires short-range missiles off coast

0
0
A missile is fired from a naval vessel during the test-firing of a new type of anti-ship cruise missile to be equipped at Korean People's Army (KPA) naval units in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) in Pyongyang

By Ju-min Park

North Korea fired two short-range missiles off its east coast on Monday, South Korean officials said, a defiant response to annual military exercises between South Korea and the United States but one which drew a swift protest from Japan.

The firing came hours before the US-South Korean military exercises were scheduled to begin, drills which the secretive North denounces as a preparation for war.

The missiles hit the sea early on Monday morning after travelling for about 490 km, according to South Korea’s defence ministry.

Ministry spokesman Kim Min-seok said North Korea fired the missiles without designating any no-sail zones, which was regarded as a provocation.

“If North Korea takes provocative actions, our military will react firmly and strongly so North Korea will regret it in its bones,” Kim told a news briefing.

Pyongyang has escalated its rhetoric against the drills, with a spokesman for its army general staff saying Washington and Seoul “should be dealt with only by merciless strikes”.

Japan quickly lodged a protest with North Korea over the latest missile launches, saying they posed a serious threat to safety at sea and in the sky.

“The ballistic missile launches by North Korea are extremely problematic conduct in terms of aviation and navigation safety,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a news conference.

“We swiftly lodged a stern protest with North Korea.”

Japan needs to tread a fine line between conveying its condemnation to Pyongyang while not derailing bilateral talks aimed at resolving the issue of Japanese citizens abducted by North Korean agents decades ago.

In July, Japan eased some sanctions on North Korea in return for the North reopening its investigation into the fate of Japanese abductees. Little progress has been made so far.

North Korea frequently tests short-range missiles off its coast as part of military drills.

The United Nations has imposed sanctions banning North Korea from using ballistic missile technologies.

Send to Kindle

Hong Kong arrests 38 as anti-China protesters scuffle with police

0
0
A protester is detained by a policeman during a demonstration against mainland traders, at Yuen Long district near the border with mainland China in Hong Kong

By Venus Wu and Bobby Yip

Hong Kong police arrested 38 people after a group of about 400 demonstrators clashed with police, in the latest sign of tension caused by China’s influence in the city.

Protesters in Yuen Long, in the New Territories just a stone’s throw from mainland China, chanted “Cancel the multiple-entry permit,” and “Topple the Chinese Communist Party,” as they complained about so-called parallel traders, who make profits by selling across the border goods bought in Hong Kong.

Demonstrators used garbage bins to block the main street in the area, halting traffic. Police used pepper spray to deter some people. A woman protester was bleeding from the nose as police dragged her away from the scene.

On Monday afternoon, a police spokesman said a total of 38 people aged 13 to 74 had been arrested for offences ranging from the possession of offensive weapons to assault and disorder.

The demonstration mirrored others in recent weeks targeting mainland Chinese visitors.

The protests have tapped a seam of resentment against China, resulting in calls for greater Hong Kong nationalism and even independence, nearly three months after police cleared away the last of the city’s pro-democracy street protests.

“We can’t walk, because all their goods pile up like mountains on the streets,” said one of the protesters, King Lee, a 23-year-old Yuen Long resident. “We should not endure this silently.”

The Sunday protests also fanned the discontent of other residents unhappy with the disruption to their daily routine.

“Why are there so many mainlanders shopping in Hong Kong? It’s because our products are good,” said another resident of the area, Tom Lau, 50, who jeered at the protesters.

“Why oppose them (the shoppers)? They are just protesting for the sake of protesting. They are just stirring up trouble. They march with the colonial flag, but we are Chinese people.”

Send to Kindle

US army chief says ‘very concerned’ at UK defence cuts

0
0
armychief

By William James

The United States’ army chief of staff said he was very concerned about the impact of cuts to British defence spending that he said had forced a review of how Britain’s troops could be deployed alongside US forces in future conflicts.

In an interview with the Daily Telegraph newspaper published on Monday, Army Chief of Staff General Raymond Odierno urged Britain to maintain defence spending at the NATO agreed level of 2 percent of national output, warning that British forces could end up fighting inside US units rather than alongside them.

“I would be lying to you if I did not say that I am very concerned about the GDP investment in the UK,” Odierno was quoted as saying by the newspaper.

Britain has cut defence spending by around 8 per cent in real terms over the last four years to help reduce a record budget deficit, shrinking the size of the armed forces by around one sixth.

“In the past we would have a British Army division working alongside an American division. Now it might be a British brigade inside an American division, or even a British battalion inside an American brigade,” Odierno said, in reference to previous conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

As a result of the cuts following the 2010 Strategic Defence and Security Review, the British army has been cut by a fifth, the air force now has just seven combat squadrons and the navy barely has enough warships to fulfil its international duties, the Daily Telegraph reported.

Britain’s Ministry of Defence said the government was committed to spending 2 per cent of GDP on defence, adding that decisions on spending level after the 2015/16 financial year had yet to be made.

In December, top US commander Lieutenant-General Ben Hodges voiced concern that Britain’s military spending could fall below a NATO target and said the country’s army did not have enough money for its needs.

Send to Kindle
Viewing all 6907 articles
Browse latest View live




Latest Images