Cyprus Mail: News Articles in English, 99-07-24

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From: The Cyprus Mail at <http://www.cynews.com/>

Saturday, July 24, 1999

CONTENTS

[01] Bank of Cyprus rides high on planned Athens listing

[02] Two more held after attack on touristsTWO MORE suspects were yesterday remanded in custody in connection with a vicious assault on two British tourists in Ayia Napa early on Tuesday morning.The Famagusta District court remanded Andreas Andreou, 22, from Ormidia outside Larnaca, and Mohamed Ali Ati, 33, from Lebanon, for six days on suspicion of assault and causing grievous bodily harm.Four other men are already being held in connection with the attack on James Bain and Thomas Cummings, both 29, and a seventh suspect is still being sought.The four are the owners and bouncers of the Ayia Napa pub Bain and Cummings were drinking in with friends shortly before the attack. Christos Nicolaou, 25, from Dherynia, Xenios Pittakas, 25, from Paralimni, Pericles Voutetsianos, 22, from Ormidia, and 19-year- old Russian Artemis Popov, now living in Larnaca, were remanded for four days on Wednesday.The two Britons suffered concussion, cuts and bruises.The court has heard that one of the two victims was punched in the face by Popov as he was leaving the Ayia Napa pub with a female companion at around 7am on Tuesday. He told his friends of the attack and they asked to see the bar manager, the court heard. Getting no response, Bain and Cummings decided to go to the local police station to report the incident.But the two tourists were followed by seven men from the bar and set upon with clubs and other weapons, police told the court.Bain and Cummings were later rushed to a local clinic.

[03] The Bishop, the bust of Elvis and the birthday suit

[04] Tourists jailed for false insurance claimsTHREE British tourists were sentenced to one month each in prison yesterday after being convicted of making false insurance claims.All three had claimed that property of theirs was stolen from the beach at Protaras, Famagusta. Julia Hicklin, 25, had claimed a video camera, £500 in cash and a camera valued at £200 were taken. Tania Williams, 24, also claimed her video camera was stolen along with a £160 pair of sunglasses, and Lee Hazelhurst, 24, said a gold bracelet and ring worth £ 925 were taken.The three were sentenced at Famagusta District Court, where Judge Tefkos Economou said there was a need to impose a deterrent sentence as the number of false insurance claims made by tourists in Ayia Napa and Protaras had increased to "worrying" levels.A British High Commission spokesman said the stiff sentence reflected the judge’s annoyance with the three. He added that the High Commission issues advisory warnings to British tourists not to try making false claims.

[05] Crash kills woman, 21A 21-year-old woman from Tseri died in a car crash yesterday.Maria Constantinou was driving on the Tseri road at around 10.35am when her car went out of control and crashed. She was killed instantly.

[06] Fatal accident taxi driver released

[07] Christofias transplant would be cheaper in Cyprus

[08] Health Ministry ‘was warned about disappearing drug’

[09] Canadian held by Turks says he is ‘ fine’

[10] Miffed Mega to broadcast anyway, despite Skai snub

[11] Four ports unions back off from overtime ban

[12] Bikes boom despite registrations slumpTHERE has been a dramatic slump in vehicle registrations during the first six months of this year, the Department of Statistics and Research announced yesterday.In its six- monthly Registration of Motor Vehicles Report, the department announced that between January and June, 17,877 vehicles were registered, a drop of 9.2 per cent on the 19,688 vehicles registered in the same period in 1998.Of the vehicles registered, 9,716 were private saloon cars, down from the 11,709 registered in the first half of 1998, a 17 per cent drop. There are still more used vehicles being registered than new in this category, however, with 6,528 used cars registered as opposed to 3,188 new.Goods conveyance vehicles went from 3,891 in the first six months of last year to 3,713 this year. The number of light goods vehicles registered went down to 3,358, an 8.2 per cent decrease, while the number of heavy goods vehicles rose slightly to 355.The only category in which the number of registrations increased over the first half of 1998 was that of motorbikes, with 3,193 registered in the January-June period, up 20.2 per cent from 2,657 in the first half of 1998.

[01] Bank of Cyprus rides high on planned Athens listing

THE PROSPECT of an Athens listing for the Bank of Cyprus, the island's financial powerhouse and market supremo, stoked the fire under the Cyprus Stock Exchange yesterday, sending share prices rocketing skywards.

News on Thursday that the Central Bank of Cyprus has raised to 50 per cent the ceiling for foreign ownership of commercial banks appeared to do to the market yesterday what, say, a pair of jet engines might do for a turboprop.

Share prices closed 10.86 per cent up at 248.09, the second consecutive record close in a market whose gains on the year now stand at an astonishing 173.37 per cent, placing the island's bourse among the world's best performers. Gains this week stood at 28.41 per cent.

Yesterday's volume also set a new record, £39.36 million.

The Bank of Cyprus, which applied for the maximum foreign ownership to be raised from 15 per cent to 50 per cent, now hopes to be traded on the Athens Stock Exchange by early 2000. It plans an issue worth £100 million in Greece during the final quarter of 1999. Together with the five per cent of its share capital already owned by non-residents, the bank will meet the minimum 15 per cent requirement for trading in Athens.

As expected, Thursday's news had an immediate impact on the share price of the bank, whose operations in Greece began in 1991 and now account for about 20 per cent of the group's profits.

The share notched up £1.24 to close at a record £10.89 on a volume worth £10.76 million. The bank's 1999-2003 warrants fared even better, closing at £7.82, up by £1.48.

"There was a mad scramble on Bank of Cyprus shares. This is what investors have been waiting for for months," said Koullis Panayiotou of CLR Stockbrokers. Trading in the shares and warrants accounted for more than 38 per cent of the day's total trading.

The seemingly incredibly strong performance by the Bank of Cyprus inspired its close rival, the Popular Bank, to hit a new high. It rose by 84.50 cents to close at £5.97. The Popular Bank warrants also rose sharply, up £1.73 to close at £8.69.

Like the Bank of Cyprus, the Popular Bank also depends on its operations in Greece for about 20 per cent of its profits and is now widely expected to speed up its own process to be listed on the Athens Stock Exchange.

Traders are unfazed by the speed with which prices have risen in the bourse since the start of the year. Indeed they are hopeful that this unprecedented bullish run will continue when Louis Cruise Lines Ltd begins to return money to investors from last week's hugely oversubscribed Initial Public Offering.

The £9.5-million issue was oversubscribed by more than 50 times, drawing a little more than £500 million from investors. Some of the refunded cash, the traders hope, will find its way to the market, snapping up the coveted Louis stocks, expected to begin trading in early August, while they are still relatively cheap or going to blue-chips.

"What is happening is unprecedented... there is a lot of euphoria and the market is looking very strong," said analyst Theodoros Mahlas of Laiki Investments, the Popular Bank's investment banking arm and brokerage.

The market, however, is scheduled to close on Monday and Tuesday to give brokerages and listed companies time to clear a massive backlog resulting from the dramatic increase in volume in recent weeks.

The automated trading system installed in May to replace the open outcry method has seen average daily transactions rocket to 4,000 from 500. The two-

day closure, decided in a meeting between the Cyprus Stock Exchange and brokers late Thursday, would be the first since the market began more than three years ago in its official capacity.

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[02] Two more held after attack on touristsTWO MORE suspects were yesterday remanded in custody in connection with a vicious assault on two British tourists in Ayia Napa early on Tuesday morning.The Famagusta District court remanded Andreas Andreou, 22, from Ormidia outside Larnaca, and Mohamed Ali Ati, 33, from Lebanon, for six days on suspicion of assault and causing grievous bodily harm.Four other men are already being held in connection with the attack on James Bain and Thomas Cummings, both 29, and a seventh suspect is still being sought.The four are the owners and bouncers of the Ayia Napa pub Bain and Cummings were drinking in with friends shortly before the attack. Christos Nicolaou, 25, from Dherynia, Xenios Pittakas, 25, from Paralimni, Pericles Voutetsianos, 22, from Ormidia, and 19-year- old Russian Artemis Popov, now living in Larnaca, were remanded for four days on Wednesday.The two Britons suffered concussion, cuts and bruises.The court has heard that one of the two victims was punched in the face by Popov as he was leaving the Ayia Napa pub with a female companion at around 7am on Tuesday. He told his friends of the attack and they asked to see the bar manager, the court heard. Getting no response, Bain and Cummings decided to go to the local police station to report the incident.But the two tourists were followed by seven men from the bar and set upon with clubs and other weapons, police told the court.Bain and Cummings were later rushed to a local clinic.

Saturday, July 24, 1999

[03] The Bishop, the bust of Elvis and the birthday suit

PAPHOS Bishop Chrysostomos is accused of idolising false gods – including Elvis Presley -- and frequenting saunas in nothing but his birthday suit.

The allegations have been made by a fringe group of Greek Orthodox Christians in Paphos who say their appointed religious leader behaves in a manner unbecoming a man of the cloth.

Bishop Chrysostomos, no stranger himself to pointing the finger at the alleged wayward behaviour of other Orthodox clerics, is accused of attending the opening of a pub in Kato Paphos and blessing a bust of rock legend Elvis.

The charges of unorthodox behaviour also extend to reported sightings of the bishop at a luxury hotel sauna without so much as fig leaf to hide his modesty.

Ironically, the accusation implicates the bishop who charged a Mount Athos monk, Father Iosif, with molesting nuns in Cyprus. It was no coincidence that Father Iosif was the mentor of the now Limassol bishop Athanassios, a man who did not get Chrysostomos’ support for the post during his candidacy earlier this year.

Not only is the Paphos bishop under fire for blessing the morals of rock n' roll, but Christian fundamentalists say his honorary membership of the Rotary Club is also tantamount to heresy.

"There is nothing heretical about the Rotary Club: if someone's an atheist they’re not invited to join," a Rotary member told the Cyprus Mailyesterday.

The list of misdemeanours allegedly committed by Bishop Chrysostomos was contained in letters written by the ‘Initiative Group of Orthodox Christians, Paphos’ which were addressed to the Archbishop and leaked to the media.

However, it is believed that the allegations were not discussed during Thursday's meeting of the Holy Synod.

The Paphos bishop left the meeting early and there were reports yesterday of disagreement among his peers within the Synod.

When asked about his visits to the sauna the bishop told waiting reporters on Thursday: "That's my business, not yours."

According to yesterday's informed newspaper reports Archbishop Chrysostomos still considers the matter "open".

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[04] Tourists jailed for false insurance claimsTHREE British tourists were sentenced to one month each in prison yesterday after being convicted of making false insurance claims.All three had claimed that property of theirs was stolen from the beach at Protaras, Famagusta. Julia Hicklin, 25, had claimed a video camera, £500 in cash and a camera valued at £200 were taken. Tania Williams, 24, also claimed her video camera was stolen along with a £160 pair of sunglasses, and Lee Hazelhurst, 24, said a gold bracelet and ring worth £ 925 were taken.The three were sentenced at Famagusta District Court, where Judge Tefkos Economou said there was a need to impose a deterrent sentence as the number of false insurance claims made by tourists in Ayia Napa and Protaras had increased to "worrying" levels.A British High Commission spokesman said the stiff sentence reflected the judge’s annoyance with the three. He added that the High Commission issues advisory warnings to British tourists not to try making false claims.

Saturday, July 24, 1999

[05] Crash kills woman, 21A 21-year-old woman from Tseri died in a car crash yesterday.Maria Constantinou was driving on the Tseri road at around 10.35am when her car went out of control and crashed. She was killed instantly.

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[06] Fatal accident taxi driver released

Police said investigations into the fatal accident were continuing.

Andriani Tzizari, 75, from Tersefanou village in the Larnaca district, died in hospital after being hit by a taxi on Grigoris Afxentiou Avenue at around 6.40am on Thursday.

The taxi driver was breathalysed after the accident and found to be sober.

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[07] Christofias transplant would be cheaper in Cyprus

COMMUNIST Akel Party leader Dimitris Christofias could have his kidney transplant surgery done in Cyprus just as easily and safely as in London, where he is going at government expense, a Cyprus kidney transplant specialist said yesterday.

Dr Mike Hadjigavriel, nephrologist at Paraskevaidion Surgical and Transplant Centre in Nicosia, said he had "no idea" why Christofias was having his surgery done in London instead of in Cyprus.

"I do not know his reasons. I did not talk to his doctors, or to him," Hadjigavriel told the Cyprus Mail. "We're doing transplants and we're having excellent results here."

"As far as I know, medically -- because I do not know his state of health -- I do not see any reasons why (Christofias could) not" have his surgery done in Cyprus, Hadjigavriel said.

Hadjigavriel said the fact that Christofias had heart bypass surgery not long ago would not necessarily complicate matters for him or for Paraskevaidion.

"We have all sorts of patients with bypasses," Hadjigavriel said. "I have not seen the patient and do not know if he has other problems, but theoretically it would not be a problem" to perform Christofias' surgery in Cyprus.

Paraskevaidion does around 35 kidney transplants a year, Hadjigavriel said. "We do these kind of operations routinely on a daily basis, and have since 1986. Our success rate is excellent. It's comparable with European and American centres."

"We're doing a large number of transplants compared to Europe and the United States, because we're a small society here -- half a million population. The rest of the world does 30 per million," he said.

Vera Polycarpou, of Akel's International Relations Bureau in Nicosia, confirmed Christofias "will be going to England... at the end of the month. About a week after that, the second week of August, he's going to have a kidney transplant in London."

But she did not know what Christofias' transplant surgery would cost in London, or who exactly was paying the cost.

Hadjigavriel said the full cost of the surgery at the Paraskevaidion Centre for a Cypriot, including all in-patient and follow-up care -- even if the government paid nothing -- would be no more than £12,000.

"In London, I think it would be surely more than £20,000 to £25,000 (Cyprus pounds) for the surgery alone," not including all other in-patient and follow-up care, he said.

Costakis Georgiou, Ministry of Health Senior Administrative Officer, confirmed the government is paying the higher cost of Christofias' kidney- transplant surgery in London "because he is a member of the House of Representatives".

"Political persons, civil servants, ministers and members of parliament are eligible (for free medical care abroad) without any economic status (determination)," said Georgiou, who added that his job involves approving such free treatment abroad.

"Other people are also eligible to go abroad," he said, "but they must contribute to their expenses according to their situation," after a means test.

Hadjigavriel said: "Usually the government pays for the (Cypriot) patients" that Paraskevaidion treats. "The government surveys the economic status of the patient and can approve the total amount of money to be paid, or part of it. But the majority of cases, it pays all," he said.

"I presume that... probably he was approved by the government to go abroad, " Hadjigavriel said.

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[08] Health Ministry ‘was warned about disappearing drug’

THE Health Ministry had been warned of possible kidney drug ‘disappearances’ a whole year ago but did nothing about it, the Pharmaceutical Association claimed yesterday.

The ministry and police are currently investigating June's shortfall in hospital supplies of erythropoetine, a drug used to improve the quality of life of dialysis patients. The probe is focusing on allegations that £22, 000 worth of the drug found its way on to the black market where it was sold, for more than £400,000, to racehorse dopers and athletes. Erythropoetine has performance-enhancing properties.

Health Minister Christos Solomis has vowed to leave no stone unturned in getting to the bottom of the scandal, but the chairman of the Pharmaceutical Association, Nicos Nouris, said yesterday the authorities had been warned of the situation a year ago.

"I must say that a year ago there was information, though unconfirmed, that there was a siphoning of the specific medicine to the private sector," Nouris said.

The Association did not know exactly what form this "siphoning" took, but it had taken the step of passing on the information to the relevant authorities anyway, Nouris said.

"The information was perhaps not taken seriously," he said.

The shortage of medicines put the lives of kidney patients at risk, patients' rights groups have protested.

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[09] Canadian held by Turks says he is ‘ fine’

Royiros Georgiou, 48, was yesterday visited by the UN in holding cells in occupied Nicosia.

"We saw him this morning and he is fine," Unficyp spokeswoman Sarah Russell told the Cyprus Mailyesterday.

She said Georgiou, a Canadian national living in Kalo Chorio in the Limassol area, refused a medical examination by a UN doctor but said he was fine and was being treated well.

Georgiou had appeared before a ‘court’ in the north on Thursday and had been remanded until Monday for ‘illegal entry’.

Russell said Georgiou had lost his way while travelling on the old Nicosia to Larnaca road on Wednesday evening and had ended up in occupied Pyri village.

Police say Georgiou was apprehended by four Turkish soldiers.

[10] Miffed Mega to broadcast anyway, despite Skai snub

STILL SMARTING after Skai TV plucked Logos out from under its nose, Mega Channel Cyprus has announced its intention to begin transmission on the island anyway.

Loucas Hellinas, a major shareholder in Mega, pointed out that Mega has had a licence to broadcast in Cyprus since 1993 – now intends to activate it.

Reports said yesterday that Hellinas also slammed Logos, saying Mega felt cheated by the church-

owned station, as they had already had a verbal agreement to buy the channel and only when they went in to sign the official contracts did they discover that there was another interested party, Skai, which had made a slightly higher offer.

The Skai offer, under which the popular Greek channel will take control of ailing Logos for £500,000 a year, was approved by the Holy Synod late on Thursday evening, although the approval was not unanimous.

Logos, which began broadcasting in late 1992, has recently slumped in the ratings thanks to its bizarre church-imposed broadcasting policies, and according to sources has been losing the mega-rich church a fortune on a daily basis.

Under the new management, the channel is expected to slacken off on the religious guidelines which drove the viewers away. However, while the Victorian-style censorship which saw films rendered incoherent by Logos’ censors who hacked out ‘offensive’ scenes will hopefully become a thing of the past, along with the dismal multi-episode religious documentaries produced by the channel, religious programming will not be completely abandoned. One condition of the Skai deal is that the station still broadcasts religious material for one hour a day every day.

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[11] Four ports unions back off from overtime ban

FOUR of the five ports unions have backed off their pledge to paralyse the island’s harbours this weekend by refusing to do overtime, ending a threat to the cruise plans of some 15,000 tourists, Ports Authority Chairman Costas Erotocritou said late yesterday.

"The passenger vessels will work," Erotocritou told the Cyprus Mail. "Quite a number" of workers are willing to handle the cruise ship traffic this weekend, he said, because port worker unions Pasydy, Sek, Peo and Deok all ended their threat to down tools after 2.30pm.

Only the union Sylak remained adamantly opposed to working overtime this weekend, he said.

The unions had threatened not to work overtime on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, potentially inconveniencing some 15,000 tourists booked aboard the seven cruise ships that docked in Limassol yesterday and the six scheduled to dock today.

And they had held out the threat of an open-ended strike in both the Limassol and Larnaca ports if their demands were not met.

The port workers want their current contracts renewed. This means all hours worked beyond 2.30pm would continue being paid at overtime rates. They also want the government to abandon plans to introduce shift work on the docks.

Normal dock hours run from 7.30am to 2.30pm. As the ports do not operate a shift system, all hours worked beyond 2.20pm are paid as overtime. Dockers now work 150 or more overtime hours per month, meaning half to two-thirds of their pay comes from overtime earnings.

Introducing a shift system would mean hiring more workers but ending overtime, thereby cutting deeply into workers' take-home pay. Erotocritou said the Limassol and Larnaca ports' wages bill comes to £6.23 million per year for about 300 workers -- an annual average wage of £20,700 per worker.

At one point before the four unions relented, the Ports Authority faced the prospect of cruise ships using only pilots to berth, as the tug-boat workers had threatened to walk out. The partial settlement ended this threat.

A meeting is scheduled for Wednesday to discuss the workers' demands, Erotocritou said.

Striking during the peak tourist season is seen as a risky gamble for the dock workers, as an independent study shows that 80 of the 185 Ports Authority workers at Limassol Port were superfluous, Erotocritou said.

Deok had originally refused to join the walkout in view of the talks scheduled for Wednesday.

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Saturday, July 24, 1999

[12] Bikes boom despite registrations slumpTHERE has been a dramatic slump in vehicle registrations during the first six months of this year, the Department of Statistics and Research announced yesterday.In its six- monthly Registration of Motor Vehicles Report, the department announced that between January and June, 17,877 vehicles were registered, a drop of 9.2 per cent on the 19,688 vehicles registered in the same period in 1998.Of the vehicles registered, 9,716 were private saloon cars, down from the 11,709 registered in the first half of 1998, a 17 per cent drop. There are still more used vehicles being registered than new in this category, however, with 6,528 used cars registered as opposed to 3,188 new.Goods conveyance vehicles went from 3,891 in the first six months of last year to 3,713 this year. The number of light goods vehicles registered went down to 3,358, an 8.2 per cent decrease, while the number of heavy goods vehicles rose slightly to 355.The only category in which the number of registrations increased over the first half of 1998 was that of motorbikes, with 3,193 registered in the January-June period, up 20.2 per cent from 2,657 in the first half of 1998.

© Copyright Cyprus Mail 1999

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