By George Georgiopoulos and Lefteris Papadimas

Greece repaid on Friday the first 310 million euro instalment of a loan from the International Monetary Fund that falls due this month as it scrambles to cover its funding needs amid a cash crunch.

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’ newly elected government must pay a total of 1.5 billion euros to the IMF this month over two weeks starting on Friday against a backdrop of fast-depleting cash coffers.

“The payment of 310 million euros has been made, with a Friday value date,” a government official told Reuters, requesting anonymity.

Athens has to pay three other instalments, on March 13, 16 and 20 as part of repayments due to the IMF this month.

Tsipras’ government has said it will make the payments but there has been growing uncertainty over Greece’s cash position as it faces a steep fall in tax revenues while aid from EU/IMF lenders remains on hold until Athens completes promised reforms.

Athens sent an updated list of reforms on Friday to Brussels ahead of a meeting of euro zone finance ministers on Monday, a Greek government official said, adding that the list expanded on an earlier set of proposals.

The list includes measures to fight tax evasion and red tape and facilitate repayment of tax and pension fund arrears owed by millions of Greeks, the official said. It also proposes a “fiscal council” to generate savings for the state.

Athens is running out of options to fund itself despite striking a deal with the euro zone in February to extend its EU/IMF bailout by four months.

Greece has monthly needs of about 4.5 billion euros, including a wage and pension bill of 1.5 billion euros. It is not due to receive any financial aid until it completes a review by lenders of final reforms required under its bailout.

Greece’s central bank chief, Yannis Stournaras, said after talks with Tsipras on Friday that Greek banks were sufficiently capitalised and faced no problem with deposit outflows.

“There is full support for Greek banks (from the ECB), there is absolutely no danger,” he said after the meeting. But he added Monday’s euro zone meeting had to be “successful”.

The ECB will resume normal lending to Greek banks only when it sees Athens is complying with its bailout programme and is on track to receive a favourable review, ECB President Mario Draghi said on Thursday.

Athens has begun tapping cash held by pension funds and other entities to avoid running out of funds as early as this month. Various short-term options it has suggested to overcome the cash crunch have been blocked by euro zone lenders.

Tsipras’ leftist Syriza was elected on Jan. 25 on a promise to end the belt-tightening that came with the EU/IMF bailouts.

By Dominic Evans and Saif Hameed

Islamic State fighters have looted and bulldozed the ancient Assyrian city of Nimrud, the Iraqi government said, in their latest assault on some of the world’s greatest archaeological and cultural treasures.

A tribal source from the nearby city of Mosul told Reuters the ultra-radical Sunni Islamists, who dismiss Iraq’s pre-Islamic heritage as idolatrous, had pillaged the 3,000-year-old site on the banks of the Tigris river, once capital of the world’s most powerful empire.

The assault against Nimrud came just a week after the release of a video showing Islamic State forces smashing museum statues and carvings in Mosul, the city they seized along with much of northern Iraq last June.

“Daesh terrorist gangs continue to defy the will of the world and the feelings of humanity,” Iraq’s tourism and antiquities ministry said, referring to Islamic State by its Arabic acronym.

“In a new crime in their series of reckless offences they assaulted the ancient city of Nimrud and bulldozed it with heavy machinery, appropriating the archaeological attractions dating back 13 centuries BC,” it said.

Nimrud, about 30 km south of Mosul, was built around 1250 BC. Four centuries later it became capital of the neo-Assyrian empire – at the time the most powerful state on earth, extending to modern-day Egypt, Turkey and Iran.

Many of its most famous surviving monuments were removed years ago by archaeologists, including colossal Winged Bulls which are now in London’s British Museum and hundreds of precious stones and pieces of gold which were moved to Baghdad.

But ruins of the ancient city remain at the northern Iraqi site, which has been excavated by a series of experts since the 19th century. British archaeologist Max Mallowan and his wife, crime writer Agatha Christie, worked at Nimrud in the 1950s.

LOOTED AND LEVELLED

“Islamic State members came to the Nimrud archaeological city and looted the valuables in it and then they proceeded to level the site to the ground,” the Mosul tribal source told Reuters.

“There used to be statues and walls as well as a castle that Islamic State has destroyed completely.”

Archaeologists have compared the assault on Iraq’s cultural history to the Taliban’s destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas in 2001. But the damage wreaked by Islamic State, not just to ancient monuments but also on some Muslim places of worship, has been swift, relentless and more wide-ranging.

Last week’s video showed them toppling statues and carvings from plinths in the Mosul museum and smashing them with sledgehammers and drills. It also showed damage to a huge statue of a bull at the Nergal Gate into the city of Nineveh.

Archaeologists said it was hard to quantify the damage, because some items appeared to be replicas, but many priceless articles had been destroyed including artefacts from Hatra, a stunning pillared city in northern Iraq dating back 2,000 years.

Iraq’s senior Shi’ite cleric, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani called on the country’s deeply divided religious and ethnic groups to come together to fight Islamic State.

“Day after day, the need is proven for everyone to unite and fight this ferocious organisation that spares neither man nor stone,” Sistani said in a Friday sermon delivered by an aide in the southern city of Kerbala.

Iraqi forces and Shi’ite militia supported by Shi’ite Iran have launched an offensive to drive Islamic State from the northern city of Tikrit and could move on Mosul later this year.

Iraqi officials said last week that Islamic State had kept many artefacts to sell to antiquities smugglers and raise revenue, and a prominent Assyrian politician told Reuters on Friday that the destruction at Nimrud was aimed at covering up the fact that the militants had stolen and sold many pieces.

Yonadam Kanna described them as “an ignorant, backward gang that seeks to erase the collective memory of Iraq and its culture and heritage”.

Modern day Iraq was one of the birthplaces of civilisation, with agriculture and writing pioneered on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers more than 5,000 years ago. Many of the cities and empires mentioned in the bible’s Old Testament were in what is now northern Iraq.

In the south, sheltered from Islamic State depredation but still damaged by years of conflict and theft, lie Babylon – site of Nebuchadnezzar’s Hanging Gardens – Ur, birthplace of the Biblical patriarch Abraham, and the imperial capitals of Arab and Iranian empires in Samarra, Baghdad and Ctesiphon.

Islamic State, which rules a self-declared caliphate in north Iraq and eastern Syria, promotes a fiercely purist interpretation of Sunni Islam which draws its inspiration from early Islamic history. It rejects religious shrines of any sort and condemns Iraq’s majority Shi’ite Muslims as heretics.

In July it destroyed the tomb of the prophet Jonah in Mosul. It has also attacked Shi’ite places of worship and last year gave Mosul’s Christians an ultimatum to convert to Islam, pay a religious levy or face death by the sword. It has also targeted the Yazidi minority in the Sinjar mountains west of Mosul.

By Iacovos Constantinou

THE first round of the ten-game playoff stage of the Cyprus Football Championship begins this weekend with a maximum of 30 points for each team to play for.

The clubs have been divided into two groups of six with the top-six teams battling for the title and the coveted second and third places that lead to Europe.
In the bottom group, the six teams will be fighting to avoid the last two positions that lead to relegation.

Leaders Apollon travel to sixth-placed Ermis Aradippou with the sole aim of maintaining their two-point lead at the top. They will be without Sangoy, Hamdani and Meriem who are suspended, and the injured Robert and Angeli.

Ermis have only the league to play for following their midweek cup exit. They are four points off third place and cannot afford to drop further behind. Dutch coach Mitchell van der Gaag welcomes back to the side De Pina while his only injury concern is Rezek who will face a late fitness test.

Champions APOEL are at home to Anorthosis in the second of three games against the Famagusta team in a matter of seven days.
Kaka is still suspended while the injury list for the home side does not seem to be getting any shorter – in fact goalkeeper Pardo is on the casualty list and is a major doubt for Saturday’s game.

AEK and Omonia are level on points in third place and a win for either side will allow them to gain an advantage over the rivals.
Omonia are enjoying a purple patch and even though their top marksman Pote is still out, they will fancy their chances against AEK. Their young midfielder Fylaktou is back in the reckoning after overcoming an injury while Maltese forward Skembri may start the game.

AEK will be without their Argentine forward Colautti but their coach Thomas Christiansen has a plethora of attack-minded players to replace him with.
On their day AEK can prove a handful for any team as leaders Apollon found out, losing twice to them and letting in eight goals.

At the other end of the table, Ayia Napa face Nea Salamina in Paralimni and know that with a win they will be level on points with their opponents.
Salmania, who began the season so promisingly, are just off the relegation zone and know that they need to start picking up points in order to survive.

Bottom of the table Doxa are at home to the indifferent AEL while the last weekend game is between Ethnikos Achnas and Othellos Athienou. Ethnikos have a six-point cushion from the danger zone and a draw will not be disastrous. On the other hand Othellos need the points to start edging up the table if they are to avoid a quick return to the second division.

GROUP A:
Saturday, March 7th: Ermis vs Apollon & APOEL vs Anorthosis (16.00)
Sunday, March 8th: AEK vs Omonia (18.00)

GROUP B:
All games on Sunday, March 8th at 16.00
Doxa vs AEL, Ehnikos Achnas vs Othellos & Ayia Napa vs Nea Salamina

A UK-based Geek Cypriot professor has launched a prototype toilet that generates electricity from urine near a students’ union bar in Bristol.

The boffins behind the “pee-power” toilet hope it can be used by aid agencies in disaster zones to supply much-needed “urine-tricity” to refugee camps.

The urinal is the result of a partnership between researchers at the University of the West of England in Bristol and international charity Oxfam.

It is located near the students’ union at the university’s Frenchay campus and researchers will be hoping for brisk business at closing time.

Students and staff are being asked to use the urinal to donate pee to fuel the microbial fuel cell stacks that generate electricity to power indoor lighting.

The research team is led by Ioannis Ieropoulos, a native of Nicosia who is an Associate Professor at the Bristol Robotics Laboratory at UWE Bristol, and is an expert at harnessing power from unusual sources using microbial fuel cells.

“We have already proved that this way of generating electricity works,” the professor said.

“Work by the Bristol BioEnergy Centre hit the headlines in 2013 when the team demonstrated that electricity generated by microbial fuel cell stacks could power a mobile phone.

“This exciting project with Oxfam could have a huge impact in refugee camps.

“The microbial fuel cells work by employing live microbes which feed on urine for their own growth and maintenance.

“The microbial fuel cell is in effect a system which taps a portion of that biochemical energy used for microbial growth, and converts that directly into electricity – what we are calling urine-tricity or pee power.

“This technology is about as green as it gets, as we do not need to utilise fossil fuels and we are effectively using a waste product that will be in plentiful supply.”

The urinal on the university campus resembles toilets used in refugee camps by Oxfam to make the trial as realistic as possible.

The technology that converts the urine in to power sits underneath the urinal and can be viewed through a clear screen.

Andy Bastable, head of water and sanitation at Oxfam, said: “Oxfam is an expert at providing sanitation in disaster zones, and it is always a challenge to light inaccessible areas far from a power supply.

“This technology is a huge step forward. Living in a refugee camp is hard enough without the added threat of being assaulted in dark places at night. The potential of this invention is huge.”

They hope the abundant, free supply of urine will make the device practical for aid agencies to use in the field.

Ieropoulos added: “One microbial fuel cell costs about £1 to make, and we think that a small unit like the demo we have mocked up for this experiment could cost as little as £600 to set up, which is a significant bonus as this technology is in theory everlasting.”

The project is being funded by the British government, the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Ieropoulos’ grant income in recent years has come to over £2m and his work has resulted in over 40 peer reviewed publications. He has been invited to author at least four chapters in leading book series, such as Applications of Electrochemistry in Biology and Medicine, Artificial Life Models in Hardware and Living Machines, and has also been invited to present at international conferences, such as CIMTEC’12 and DSTL SOAR Meetings. (PA)

The relatives of people killed in a 2011 naval base blast oppose granting a pardon to former defence minister Costas Papacostas who was jailed in connection with the incident.

The relatives met President Nicos Anastasiades on Friday to discuss their problems.

“I can only say that President Nicos Anastasiades has not disappointed us,” said Popi Christoforou, whose twin sons, both sailors aged 19, died in the July 11 blast at the Mari base.

Papacostas, 76, has requested a pardon citing his poor health. He has been in hospital since he was given a five year sentence in 2013 on charges of manslaughter for his role in the blast in which 13 sailors and firemen died.

Asked about the request, Christoforou “the only thing I can say is that a pardon is one thing, forgiveness is another.”

Christoforou wondered why Papacostas had asked for a pardon.

“For someone who is ill to come out of hospital?” she said. “The best place for someone who is ill is the hospital.”

Her husband Michalis criticised two MEPs – Eleni Theocharous and Takis Hadjigeorgiou — who supported granting a pardon, and DISY MP Andreas Themistocleous who spoke of the Christian faith.

“Where is the Christian faith and where is the dignity towards the relatives? This thing must be taken into serious consideration,” he said.

By George Psyllides

A post mortem on a nine-month-old baby who apparently died from meningitis will be carried out on Sunday, the health ministry said, four days after she died, with state pathologists saying they could not do the procedure citing lack of the necessary equipment.

The post mortem will be carried out by state pathologist Aggeliki Papeta. The two other pathologists said it was too risky to carry out without the proper means.

The procedure had been requested by the parents who were not convinced that bacterial meningitis was the cause of death.

Christos Flourentzos, the father, reiterated that pathologists had tried to dissuade them from having the procedure, but meningitis has not been recorded in any statements as the cause of death.

“We want it to be done as soon as possible so that we can bury our child,” he said.

The health ministry had secured a court order on Thursday asking the pathologists to carry out the procedure or face legal consequences.

Health ministry permanent secretary Christina Yiannaki assured the parents that the procedure would be carried out on Sunday.

Minister Philippos Patsalis rejected the pathologists’ claims.

Such post mortems, he said, were done frequently across the globe, not just Cyprus, whose infrastructure and equipment was better than some other countries.

Patsalis said it was not possible for the disease to be transmitted from a dead person to a live one, unlike HIV, Ebola, and mad cow disease, which can survive between 24 hours and three days after death.

“State officials cannot refuse to provide a service citing reasons that are not valid medically or legally,” the minister said.

House Health Committee chairman Coastakis Constantinou said the pathologists’ actions were going to be discussed in parliament.

Paphos Mayor Phedonas Phedonos said on Friday he would not be deterred from cleaning up the municipality, following the explosion of a low-grade device behind the town hall on Thursday night.

The explosive device went off in a park behind the town hall at around 8pm on Thursday, police said.

According to Paphos police spokesman Nicos Tsiappis, a fire extinguisher was rigged to blow in 28^th October park. There were no injuries or property damage.

It was the second such incident in the past two months, according to Tsiappis.

Phedonos told the Cyprus Mail on Friday that if someone wanted to send a message to the municipality’s employees, the elected officials or to him, then that message was received.

“And that message is that we will not stop our efforts to bring transparency in all of the municipality’s dealings and finally put an end to impunity. We have the resolve and we will keep going,” said the mayor.

“We have a lot of stuff on our plate right now. We are looking into dealings regarding the district’s waste management plant, the work done at the town’s coastal road and many others. We are hard at work, and as I said we won’t be deterred.”

The Paphos municipality went through a rough patch recently, after former mayor Savvas Vergas was handed a six-year prison sentence on charges of corruption and money laundering. Phedonos succeeded Vergas in a special election, shortly after the former mayor resigned his post.

Almost 20,000 people had been unemployed for more than six months – 41 per cent of the total unemployed – at the end of December, labour department statistics show.

The majority of the 19, 645 long-term unemployed were secretaries or typists (3,909), followed by unskilled workers (3,790), production technicians (3,142) and the services sector (2,653).

By economic activity, 5,227 or 26.6 per cent of long-term unemployed come from the services sector, 3,743, or 19.1 per cent from the trade sector, 3,258, or 16.6 per cent from the construction sector and 2,189, or 11.1 per cent from the manufacturing sector.

The largest concentration of long-term unemployed were in the district of Nicosia (37 per cent), Limassol (27 [per cent , Larnaca (22 per cent), Paphos (10 per cent) and Famagusta (4 per cent). (CNA)

Greece must realise there is no other way than to reform, European Central Bank governing council member Luc Coene said in an interview published on Saturday, telling Greeks they had been sold “false promises” by radical leftists now in power.

The Belgian central bank chief said that life outside the euro zone would be far worse for Greek people and warned that if Athens wanted to be financed by the euro zone, the ECB and the International Monetary Fund, it had to follow the rules.

“I do not believe there is a radically different way,” he told Belgian daily De Tijd. “Syriza has made promises it can not keep,” he said, adding that the Greek people “will understand quickly that they were deceived by false promises.”

Like his euro zone colleagues, Coene had a clear message for Greece, saying: “Reform is the only way … Tell me where the money should come if the Greeks do not want reform and do not want to repay other European countries?”

Greeks voted for Alexis Tsipras, leader of Greece’s far-left Syriza party, in January because of his promises to renegotiate the country’s EU/IMF bailout that many feel punished the country and drove it into an economic depression.

But EU leaders say Greece’s prospects have improved greatly since it nearly crashed out of the euro in 2010 and, as economic growth returns, urge it to continue the reform process.

Still cut off from financial markets, Tsipras eventually requested a four-month extension to its euro zone bailout last month. Athens needs to deliver detailed plans to get new loans.

“If they leave the euro, it will be ten times worse for them. Ten times,” Coene said.

Euro zone finance ministers will discuss Greece’s reforms at their meeting in Brussels on Monday, but time is short, because Greece is facing big repayments to its creditors and is running out of cash to fund itself.

Energy Minister Giorgos Lakkotrypis leaves on Saturday for the US for a series of meetings in Washington, New York and Boston.

Lakkotrypis will on Monday meet y in Washington with US Secretary of State responsible for Energy Diplomacy Amos Hochstein. On the same day, he will present developments in oil issues in the Eastern Mediterranean to the influential think tank German Marshall Fund and Atlantic Council.

On Tuesday, the minister will continue his contacts in the capital, with separate meetings with members of the Board of the American-Israeli Public Affairs, Committee and the American Jewish Committee.

On Wednesday. Lakkotrypis will be the keynote speaker at a business forum jointly organised in New York by the ministry, the Cyprus Chamber of Commerce and the Cyprus Investment Promotion Agency.

The visit will end Friday with the participation of an open debate on energy geopolitical issues, which will be held in Boston, at the School of Law and Diplomacy of the FletcherTufts University and a second one at the Centre for European Studies at the University of Harvard.

He returns to Cyprus Sunday, March 15.

The UK Football Association said it was willing to investigate after a victory for England Women over Australia was followed by allegations that a group of spectators from the British Army shouted sexist abuse during the game.

An Army contingent based in Cyprus attended England’s 3-0 win at the low-profile Cyprus Cup tournament in Nicosia on Friday.

Two female England supporters who were at the game said the troops targeted Australian defender Servet Uzunlar throughout the match, as well as the Australian team’s substitutes as they took off their tracksuits before entering the field.

Rachel O’Sullivan and Sophie Downey, who cover women’s football for www.girlsontheball.com, said the majority of the alleged abuse was made towards the Australian players and substitutes, whose bench was on the side of the pitch where the soldiers were sitting.

Downey said: “We’ve been to lots of games before and we can engage in banter, but this wasn’t banter – it was constant, gender-specific abuse.

“There were around 50 troops watching the game and a group of around 10 of them were directing constant insults – they were on the side of the Australian dugout so it was more focused on their players.

“We weren’t sure whether to tweet about it because it’s the Army and we didn’t want to offend people – I’m a very proud English person and I’m very proud of what the Army do – but I was ashamed of them today.”

O’Sullivan added: “One Australian player, number six (Uzunlar), they were harassing her over and over and over again, throughout the game.

“They were making horrible comments, shouting at her, whistling – it was uncomfortable to hear. These are teenage girls and they were sexually objectifying them.”

An MoD spokeswoman said: “Behaviour of the kind described is totally unacceptable and is not tolerated in the Armed Forces where abuse, bullying and discrimination have no place.

“We are investigating these claims and if it is found that any UK personnel have fallen below the high standards we expect then appropriate action will be taken.”

Downey and O’Sullivan said they complained to the commander in charge of the contingent at the end of the match and he apologised, saying he had not heard the abuse.

An FA spokesperson told Press Association Sport: “We’ve spoken to the (England) players, manager and assistant manager after the game and none of them have said they heard anything during the game worthy of reporting or complaining about.

“They appreciated the British Army’s support and were happy to have photographs taken with the Army boys at the end of the game.”

The FA spokesperson added: “The FA will investigate all allegations of discriminatory abuse. If anyone did experience any form of discriminatory behaviour we would urge people to report it by calling 0800 085 0508, emailing reportdiscrimination@thefa.com or downloading the Kick It Out app from the App store of Google Play.”

An Australian supporter at the match, who wished to remain anonymous, said: “This was a stunning one-off that I’ve never heard before in women’s football.

“They were calling the girls t****, telling the referee ‘I’d like to blow you’.

“I said something to the Army sergeant, ‘This isn’t a complaint as an Australian supporter, it’s a complaint as a woman’. It was beyond the pale.

“He was apologetic after the game and offered to apologise to the players.

“He said they’re just a bunch of young boys, but I have 17 and 18-year-old brothers, I know what they’re like but they wouldn’t say that to strangers.”

The controversy comes after recordings of fans at Manchester United and Manchester City abusing Chelsea club doctor Eva Carneiro were broadcast by the BBC on Thursday night, prompting the London club to call for an end to sexism in football. (Press Association)

A robber grabbed two bags of groceries out of a woman’s hands as she exited her car outside her home in Nicosia on Friday night but he failed to notice she had a briefcase with the day’s takings in the passenger seat.

According to police reports, the woman, 52, an employee of a fruit and vegetable shop reported that around 7.40pm a man wearing a hood and black clothing grabbed the two shopping bags she was carrying and fled as she got out of her car.

The woman also had a briefcase with the day’s takings in the vehicle and was about to open the door on the passenger side to take it out when she realised someone was standing behind her.

The robber grabbed the grocery bags out of her hands and fled before she had taken out the briefcase with the takings. Police are investigating.

Primary school and kindergarten teachers’ union POED have announced a 35-minute work stoppage for Wednesday to protest against the work schedule of substitute teachers, which they say is disruptive.

The protest will take place between 11.05am and 11.40am, when the teachers will abstain from lessons but the children will remain in school under supervision.

In a letter sent to parents, POED said that the substitute teacher mechanism was causing causes serious problems.

Last September when the substitute teachers’ appointment terms changed. Up until then, primary school substitutes were paid for a full-time schedule even if they worked fewer hours but the policy was revised, and substitute teachers are now paid only for the hours they teach.

The new regime prevents replacement teachers from fully responding to their duties,w which include more than just teaching in class, POED argued in a letter to the ministry.

The union said the new terms were putting off substitute teachers, who now turn down short-term postings, especially in rural areas, creating understaffing problems in some schools.

“All this, coincides unfortunately with the critical issues of youth delinquency, the non-filling of vacant positions needed for adequate staffing, ambiguity for the staffing of schools next year, all of which make teaching more difficult at the expense of teachers and students,” the letter said.

The union decided to go ahead with the work stoppage because it said, the education ministry, despite repeated warnings, had not responded.

The union is urging parents to support POED and demand that schools be properly staffed.

By Maria Gregoriou

THE Cyprus Symphony Orchestra, which has been providing Cypriot audiences with fine classical musical performances since 2006, will present some rare musical talent during three performances of the concert Fugue – Mystery – Dance.

The concerts, for which the orchestra is collaborating with the Goethe-Institut Cyprus, will be held on Wednesday in Larnaca, on Thursday in Limassol and Nicosia on Friday.

The concerts open with Cypriot composer Andreas Moustoukis’ work Octana, based on Andreas Empirikos’ surrealist poem by the same title.

Moustoukis, from Nicosia, studied at the St Petersburg State Conservatory and works at the Arte Music Academy in Nicosia.

The composer chose a poem from the Greek surrealist poet, who is considered to be among those who changed the face of poetry in Greece. His poetic technique is characterised by a lack of punctuation, something that gained him much recognition. He is considered to be one of the most representative of the 30s generation poets, as he contributed greatly to the introduction of modernism in Greek letters.

The opening will be followed by a performance from the internationally acclaimed accordionist Denis Patkovic, who will interpret Johann Sebastian Bach’s fascinating harpsichord concerto in A major in his own arrangement for accordion, and Astor Piazzolla’s passionate tango Fuga y Misterio from his tango-opera Maria de Buenos Aires.

In the second part of the concert, the intense tango pulse and atmosphere of Piazzolla’s work will give way to the somber colours, improvisatory clarinet passages and exhilarating rhythms in Zoltan Kodaly’s symphonic expression of folk dances from Galanta and Marosszek.

Patkovic has appeared in concerts throughout Europe, South America, New Zealand and Japan.

He was recently named First Guest Professor of Accordion at Senzoku Gakuen College of Music in Tokyo. His musical talent is very well known and has been picked up by leading international music magazines, which have rated the accordionist very highly.

Apart from receiving much praise in the press, the musician has also received a number of prizes and awards, among them the prestigious award for soloists from the European Art Foundation.

The concerts will be conducted by the renowned maestro Dariusz Mikulski, who is also a French horn player, the professor at the Music Academy of Łodz, General Manager of Concorno Kulturmanagement in Berlin, and who is also a guest conductor of the Thailand Philharmonic Orchestra in Bangkok.
Mikulski has collaborated with many renowned orchestras in the world, mainly in Germany and Poland.

He also received the Gloria Artis medal from the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage in 2008 for his artistic activity, making him one of the youngest artists in the history of Polish culture to achieve the medal.

In 2011 he was also awarded with the Silver Medal of the City of Berlin, for his cultural contribution.

Fugue – Mystery – Dance
Concert presented by the Cyprus Symphony Orchestra and the Goethe-Institut Cyprus. March 11. Larnaca Municipal Theatre, Larnaca. 8.30pm. €12/7. Tel: 22-463144
March 12. Rialto Theatre, Limassol
March 13. Pallas Theatre, Nicosia

President Nicos Anastasiades departs on Sunday for Manama, Bahrain, for an official visit. He will be accompanied by Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides and Government Spokesman Nicos Christodoulides.

During his visit Anastasiades will meet with the King of Bahrain Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa and the two leaders will hold official talks as heads of their respective delegations. In the framework of the talks, bilateral agreements will be signed between the Republic of Cyprus and Bahrain.

The President will also meet members of the Cypriot community in Bahrain.

Anastasiades will return to Cyprus on March 10.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is dedicated to reaching a comprehensive settlement on the Cyprus problem, his Special Representative in Cyprus Lisa Buttenheim said on Saturday.

Buttenheim was speaking during a handover of a joint declaration by the Women`s Movement of AKEL POGO and the Women`s Organisation of the Republican Turkish Party (CTP) to mark women’s day on Sunday.

Handing over the declaration POGO Secretary General, MP Skevi Koukouma said that in it “we express our will and our position for the future of Cyprus”
“This is what we are all striving to achieve in the United Nations: a comprehensive settlement,” Buttenheim replied.
“The Secretary General is dedicated to this and we will continue to keep trying for this,” she added.

Earlier Koukouma and the head of CTP`s Women`s Organisation Sibel Sorakin read out the joint declaration in Greek and Turkish respectively.
The women urge “the leaders of the two communities to work for the resumption of the peace process under UN auspices and to commit themselves to the attainment of a solution within the framework agreed, by maintaining the achieved convergences of Christofias-Talat, as soon as possible”.

They call “for the termination of any provocative actions, since we are convinced that they obstruct the resumption of the direct negotiations, they only serve the perpetuation of the unacceptable status quo and keep hostage the prospects of a mutually acceptable solution”.

They declare “our commitment to a solution guaranteeing the respect of the human rights of all Cypriots and demilitarising our country”.
They also reminded the leaders of both communities of the significant role women could play in the peace process in Cyprus.

“We, the women of Cyprus, reassert our determination to keep working together, beyond any dividing lines and through the adoption of further initiatives, for the achievement of our common causes,” they said, adding that it was their hope that their cooperation would set the example.

The government is optimistic that the House will pass the insolvency framework after the fifth and final bill was approved by the cabinet on Friday, Government Spokesman Nicos Christodoulides said on Saturday.

A green light from Parliament on the insolvency framework would then pave the way for implementation of the foreclosures legislation, which must come into force prior to completion of the fifth review of the island’s bailout programme. Then Cyprus can avail of the next tranche of aid, which has been postponed since December over the repeated suspension of the foreclosures law.

The House had passed the foreclosures bill into law in September but had voted to suspend its implementation on December 18, until the insolvency framework, meant to create a safety net for people affected by the crisis, could also be implemented.

“We expect that the House of Representatives which meets this week to discuss the matter will reach a positive outcome so that we can overcome this obstacle, this situation which has been created and the review on our lenders part can be positively completed, so that we can proceed to take the next very important steps forward,” Christodoulides said, adding that the government was optimistic deputies would do the right thing.

“The goal is by and large a common one,” he said.

The spokesman was also asked on Saturday ‘who knew what, and when?’, and to what extent the government had opted to turn the screws on depositors, in respect of the March 2013 deposits haircut, an issue that has hit the political arena in recent days.
Christodoulides said the politicians currently bickering over the issue should be more honest.

“Can anyone imagine that this government or any other government would not opt for a better solution had there been one?”, he said. “How could anyone imagine such a scenario?”
The alternative to the bail-in would have been the dissolution of the Bank of Cyprus, the island`s largest lender, and not just Laiki. (CNA)

By Loucas Charalambous

I MUST admit I quite enjoy the foolish arguments used by our politicians and journalists when they attack the English, the Americans, the EU and officials of the UN. Given half an opportunity, they lash out against them, on the pretext that the above refuse to support our side, which is always in the right, and sit Turkey, which is always in the wrong, in the dock.

They are accused of following a hypocritical policy of double standards. The nonsensical comments made by President Anastasiades on his Moscow trip combined with the US and British reaction gave this bunch the excuse to bombard us with their anti-American and anti-West sloganeering.

This attitude explains how and why we are in the current mess. It is a sick mentality that is based on our political mythology of the last 50-plus years which maintains that for everything that has happened to this country the Turks and the West are to blame. We are completely blameless, the only ones without sin, but we are the envy of the whole world which has been constantly conspiring to destroy us.

While we are listening to all this rubbish from the AKEL, DIKO and EDEK leaderships as well as from the rest of our political scoundrels who remain stuck in the Makarios political culture, we accept it. But when we hear this coming from the mouths of Anastasiades and Foreign Minister Ioannis Kasoulides, two men from DISY, the party set up some 40 years ago with the aim of fighting this sick political culture, destroying the myths, speaking honestly to people, modernising our primitive political attitudes, we can only despair.

Both told us that the behaviour of the Western countries was hypocritical and Pharisaic because they did not condemn Turkey for its ‘invasion’ of the Cypriot EEZ whereas they wanted to crush President Putin over the Ukraine. Both are outraged when they are told that the two cases are very different. But they are.

Our politicians, including Anastasiades and Kasoulides, pretend they do not know the Cyprus problem. Turkey does not recognise the Republic and that is the problem. Turkey’s position – much as we do not like it – is generally accepted by foreign countries and is along the following lines: The Greek Cypriots destroyed the partnership state of 1960, Turkish Cypriots have not been participating in it since 1964, they have set up on their own and therefore the Greek Cypriots represent only half of Cyprus; Greek Cypriots were not committed to a settlement that would lead to the establishment of a new partnership state, in contrast to the Turkish Cypriot who proved they were. For as long as this situation continues we will look after the rights of the Turkish Cypriots and will not allow the Greek Cypriots to usurp them.

This is the argument Turkey uses to justify its incursions into the Cypriot EEZ from which we want the Americans and the British to kick her out. It is also the reason we are told that the two cases are not the same. It is understandable that Turkey’s actions infuriate the Greek Cypriots who have been inculcated with the mythology about the “Turkish Cypriot rebellion”, the evil US, back-stabbing Britain, nasty NATO, the hypocritical EU and virtuous, principled Russia by our political demagogues.

Anastasiades and Kasoulides, after all these years, are emulating Makarios who thought he could play games in the ring in which the two world superpowers were sparring, with result that they crushed us. After all these years and with the benefit of hindsight, we have learnt nothing from these criminal mistakes.

Neither Anastasiades nor Kasoulides – not to mention the other political dwarfs – have understood what our problem is. They continue the demagoguery and the frivolous political games instead of concentrating on finding a solution to the problem and explaining to people why it is necessary and the risks of leaving it unsolved.

A Nicosia businessman describes how he nearly lost thousands in an unauthorised bank transfer when his email and PC were hacked

LAST MONTH I received a call from my banker asking me about two money transfers (six figure sum in total) I had supposedly requested to be made abroad for some product purchases.

I told her that I had no idea what she was talking about and that I had never authorised such payments. My banker insisted that she double checked the instructions I had supposedly given via electronic mail and all documentation/IP addresses. Even the style of the instructions was identical to the previous ones I had made.

She told me that the payments I had allegedly ordered had alerted the authorities (police) in Germany (the transfer requested was made to a German bank) and that they managed to stop the second transfer payment. The first transfer had been executed but the German bank, after instructions by the German police, had blocked the amount as a suspicious transfer. They wanted to question the owner of the account before any money was released.

It was obvious that both my PC and email account had been hacked and I had to report the case to the police. I started making calls as to where I should report this. I first called the Cyber Crime unit who told me that I had to report the case to the Economic Crime Investigation Unit (ECIU) but had to wait till Monday (the incident happened on Friday) because the ECIU only worked till 15.00!

Not wanting to leave this unreported over the weekend I went to the nearest police station to report the case. I made my deposition and was told that I would be contacted by the ECIU but it could take a week as my ‘case’ needed time (around 5 km distance) to get to their offices!

The following Monday, and after I spent the weekend with our IT people at the office trying to get some more clues, I called our internet service provider and managed to talk to their IT head.

He told me how difficult it was to locate these people even with an IP address as hackers are expert at concealing their tracks and could have used somebody else’s IP address to access my PC.

However he did promise that they would be monitoring the IP addresses that seem to have hijacked my PC, but they could only disclose the owner(s) of the IP addresses if I could get a court order.

For that to happen I had to talk to the police again. So I called, and after explaining my ‘case’, I was connected to a very polite police officer who told me that they were aware of the case and as soon it got to the ECIU I would be contacted.

During that week I called and spoke to the ECIU at least three times. Each time they assured me that they would be contacting me soon, putting the delay down to bureaucracy.

Three weeks on and I have yet to receive any call from the ECIU.

To be honest I am not all that concerned whether they call anymore. Thankfully the German police and the German bank acted with professionalism and decisiveness. The whole amount was safely returned to my account just a week after the case was made known to me.

Thank you German police.

By Angelos Anastasiou

IN TANDEM with the development of increasingly complex financial products – not least methods of payment execution – financial crime has devised new ways to exploit weaknesses in the system, and authorities tasked with defending the public against it can usually only react after the fact.

In the words of former US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, “innovation tends to outpace regulation”.

Criminal ingenuity notwithstanding, however, some basic precautions would normally suffice to keep you relatively safe from internet thieves. Things like not disclosing sensitive personal information and having effective anti-spyware installed on a computer could make the difference between being robbed or not. Also, your personal banker exercising common sense.

A few weeks ago, on a Friday, a Cypriot businessman received a phonecall from his banker asking him to confirm the payment orders he had emailed her earlier. He thought she had called the wrong number, as he had given his bank no such instructions, through email or otherwise.

It turned out that, unbeknownst to him, his email account had been hacked, and two instructions had been emailed to his personal banker, for the payment of tens of thousands of euros from his company’s trading account to an account in a German bank in the name of one Markus Werner. The payment invoices – attached to the instructions – were supposedly for the purchase of products comically unrelated to the man’s business – a 60-seater bus, among other things.

One payment made it through, for a little more than €50,000, but the second – a substantially larger amount – was delayed.

Markus Werner received the money, asked his bank to exchange some €40,000 to Baht – the Thai currency – and attempted to send the exchanged amount to “his girlfriend in Thailand”. This was where red flags were raised by the German police, who blocked the transaction and asked the bank for more information on the origin of the funds.

The scam was averted when the German bank contacted the businessman’s banker in Cyprus for clarifications, who only then called her customer.

Though the money was promptly returned to the businessman’s account, the incident had certainly alarmed him, and he tried to report it to the local police. He was referred to the Economic Crime Investigation Unit (ECIU), but was told to call on Monday as they got off work at 3pm. He ended up paying a visit to the nearest police station, just so that he could have the complaint on record as soon as possible.

He was told his statement would be forwarded to the ECIU as soon as possible, and they would be in touch with him in due course. Three weeks later, he was still waiting for the call.

Lieutenant Christos Christodoulou, ECIU chief, said the case was not harmed in the slightest by the fact that the ECIU had been unreachable.

“This man spoke to the Crime Inspection Department, of which we are a part, because they have around-the-clock shifts,” Christodoulou said. “Proper procedure was followed, a statement was taken and forwarded to us – nothing more could have been done even if he had reached us directly.

“And it would have worked the same way if things were reversed – that is, if a person came to us with a case that was jurisdictionally the CID’s, we wouldn’t necessarily send him off to them. Most likely, we would take the statement and forward the case to CID. Depending on urgency, we could even fax them the statement and any supporting documentation immediately.”

Given the above, the need for a financial crime unit is not evident as any CID member appears interchangeable with ECIU staff. Nonetheless, the case is now with Christodoulou’s team, who said that per procedure, it will engage Interpol to request that Werner be questioned, and – if need be – extradited to Cyprus. It’s waiting time.

But the issue of how – apparently – easy it is for a bank in Cyprus to be fooled by scammers and hackers into making unauthorised payments is another can of worms.

“Based on the kinds of complaints we receive, sometimes the plaintiff bears at least some of the responsibility inasmuch as he may receive an email from a long-standing trading partner, saying they have moved their accounts to another bank in some obscure country,” Christodoulou noted. “Sometimes the most sensible thing – picking up the phone to confirm – isn’t done.”

When it was pointed out that this wasn’t such a case, Christodoulou became mildly defensive.

“It’s not my job to assign blame,” he said cautiously. “In this instance, let me just say that the Central Bank of Cyprus has issued a directive to all banks not to rely on emailed instructions alone to make payments – to seek secondary confirmation. I’ll leave it at that.”

Not so, said Yiangos Demetriou, director of bank supervision at the Central Bank.

“It is up to the banks and their clients if they agree to an arrangement of emailed payment instructions,” he said. “There is no directive.”

But then there’s the issue of the nature of the payments. Anti-money laundering “Know Your Customer” guidelines mandate that personal bankers be familiar with their clients’ businesses, and approve payments on the basis of the customer’s “business profile”, flagging and seeking additional information on anything deviating from their normal course of business. “Reasonable suspicion” to the legitimacy of a transaction is the minimum standard set by law.

“The bank certainly had an obligation to evaluate such transactions as being out of the customer’s normal business activity,” confirmed Demetriou. “Anti-money laundering legislation is clear on this.”

Last month, security firm Kaspersky Labs issued a report describing the single greatest bank heist – technically, a series of smaller heists – in history, with loot anywhere from $300 to $900 million as late as 2013, carried out online by hackers via unauthorised wire transfers.

The story serves to remind that, almost by default, innovation does outpace regulation, but sometimes the antidote to seemingly complex issues can just be a healthy dose of common sense.

Related link http://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/02/17/kaspersky-labs-center-bank-theft-discovery/W0WotFq6fCI2hLCV0h6CfI/story.html