Cyprus Mail: News Articles in English, 01-06-28

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From: The Cyprus Mail at <http://www.cyprus-mail.com/>

Thursday, June 28, 2001

CONTENTS

[01] Fury as Limassol road works dent into profits

[02] Civil aviation workers refuse to hand over transit bus to CY driver

[03] EU concern about current account deficits among candidates

[04] Council of Europe insists Turkey must pay up

[05] Officials play down water contamination problems

[06] An end to compulsory voting?

[07] Staff call off Development Bank strike

[01] Fury as Limassol road works dent into profits

PROFITS are down and tempers high as the road works plough on in Limassol, this time on the opposite side of the road to the main tourist thoroughfare, dubbed The Strip.

The government and the municipality are footing the £2.4 million bill to bulldoze the road in order to install a sewage drainage system, cables for street lighting, pave the pavements and widen the road into a dual carriageway.

Gaping trenches scar 1.6km of road; bulldozers, dust and mounds of rubble have surrounded a string of top class hotels on the sea front.

Construction work has finished on the south side, but the diggers have crossed the road to dig the north side, outraging shopkeepers and restaurant owners who are seeing their businesses strangled.

One chef told the Cyprus Mail that his takings had been hammered by the construction work.

"I used to make £1,000 a day, mainly from tourists; £600 at lunch and £400 for dinner. Now I'm down to 15 to 20 guests every night. I'm making peanuts, " he said.

"People can walk up to my door, but they have to dodge holes in the ground. It's dangerous for children and wheelchair access is impossible," he added.

Too frightened to give his name, he said the authorities would make trouble for him if he talked to the media.

Instead he is arguing with his business partner over whether to close until the bulldozers leave.

One souvenir shop manager said dust from the rubble was ruining his stock of clothes and swimwear, displayed inside, but vulnerable next to an open window.

"First they said they'd finish at the end of May, now it's the first week of August, but I doubt it. Nobody listens to us. Of course I'm angry," he said.

"I've complained many times. The municipality only listens. They promise, promise, promise, but its only promises. You can't say anything in Cyprus," said the chef.

Limassol's reputation took a denting when the BBC travel programme Wish You Were Here? exposed the ugliness and massive inconvenience of the road works to tourists.

But the municipality, the government and the Cyprus Tourism Organisation yesterday brushed aside the discontent.

"We only had complaints during the first few days. Now they're used to it and people are anxious to co-operate in order finish as soon as possible," said the Chairman of the Ayios Tychonas Community Board, Pambos Ioannou.

He said they were working full speed. Some 17 diggers were in action with three teams of workmen working from 7am to 6pm with half an hour lunch break and perhaps the odd 10-minute rest.

"Accessibility is now much better for the hotels on the coast," said chief executive engineer for design Dr Andreas Papasozomenos.

He denied that tourism was at risk, because the intended deadline of July comes "before" the season gets in full swing.

But the deadline has now pushed to early August, with Communications Minister Averoff Neophytou due to open the polished stretch of road on August 11.

Road works will start again on October 1 and run to at least January 30 2002, as two 1.2km stretches of the same road get the same treatment - one side at a time.

Ioannou said the stretches ran from Milia Court to the link up with the main road into Limassol and from the Atlantica Bay Hotel to the Elias Beach Hotel.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2001

[02] Civil aviation workers refuse to hand over transit bus to CY driver

CIVIL aviation workers have refused to hand over an airport bus to a Cyprus Airways (CY) driver to transfer passengers from the controversial transit lounge at Larnaca to the departure area.

Last month, France's biggest Middle Eastern tour agency threatened to break its contract with CY over the treatment of transit passengers, who were being herded into a former luggage room with no windows, no air conditioning and no toilets, to await onward flights to the Middle East.

After years of protesting to the Communications and Works Ministry, CY was last month promised a bus to transfer the beleaguered passengers, and went ahead with the employment of a driver.

A Ministry spokesman at the time passed the buck to CY saying they had given the bus and that the problems emanated from the airline's delay in hiring a driver.

However, sources close to CY yesterday told the Cyprus Mail that when the new driver had gone to the airport to begin work, civil aviation employees refused to let him drive any of the vehicles.

"They even staged a work stoppage in protest and were objecting to him taking the bus," the source said. "A few days later, he went back, but the same thing happened. All because union members didn't want to deal with someone employed by Cyprus Airways."

The Cyprus government has long touted Larnaca's potential as a major hub for air traffic between the Middle East and Europe, but the Paris-based Lebanese tour operator George Kairoz told the Cyprus Mail last month that is clients were being treated like baggage.

He was unavailable for comment yesterday. The source said Kairoz was still protesting, but to no avail. If the Lebanese operator carries out his threat to pull out, CY could lose up to half its passenger traffic on the Paris route and endanger plans to open up a Paris-Larnaca-Dubai flight.

CY spokesman Tassos Angelis said yesterday: "We agreed with the Ministry on a solution to alleviate the problem, but this has not been possible because of the attitude of the civil aviation workers at the airport."

Vassos Pyrgos, permanent secretary of the Communications and Works Ministry, told the Cyprus Mail he had not been informed of the situation and would look into it today.

Last month, Pyrgos said that although the transit lounge was "not the best of rooms" reports of its unsuitability had been exaggerated.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2001

[03] EU concern about current account deficits among candidates

AS THE government yesterday released details of its pre-accession economic programme (PEP), the EU said it was worried about the current account deficits of some candidate countries following their individual submissions.

A statement issued in Stockholm by the Swedish EU presidency called on the countries, mainly from Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, to attract investment through further reforms.

"There was a certain degree of concern about the financing of current account deficits," the statement said. "There is a need for reforms to create an investment-friendly environment and to raise domestic savings in order to diversify the forms of financing."

The statement was released in connection with the presentation of PEP programmes for half of the 12 candidate countries - Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary and Latvia. The statement did not specify whether Cyprus was among the countries about which the EU was concerned.

Cyprus yesterday released details of its submission, which was officially handed to the EU in May.

According to the PEP projections, the rate of economic growth during 2000- 2004 would be around 4.5 per cent in real terms, resulting in a further convergence with the average standard of living of EU member states.

Export of services will continue to be the main fuel to growth, while unemployment is expected to be contained at three per cent. The rate of inflation is projected at two per cent, excluding the temporary effects from the planned increases of indirect taxes.

The released document says the island's current account balance was expected to exhibit a favourable trend and record a steady improvement from a deficit of 5.2 per cent of GDP in the year 2000 to a near-balanced budget by 2004.

"According to the projections of the PEP, the satisfaction of the convergence criteria as set by the Maastricht Treaty is considered to be both realistic and feasible," the document said.

"We have examined the key economic challenges that the candidate countries are facing, including the challenges for fiscal policies, appropriate exchange rate arrangements and the need for labour market reforms,' said Sven Hegelund, State Secretary and chairman of the meeting between the EU presidency and top officials from the applicant countries.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2001

[04] Council of Europe insists Turkey must pay up

TURKEY cannot avoid executing judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), the Council of Europe's (CoE) Secretary-general Walter Schwimmer said in Strasbourg yesterday.

Commenting on Tuesday's third interim resolution by the CoE Committee of Ministers warning Ankara it should pay up in the Titina Loizidou case, Schwimmer said that a case of human rights violations in Cyprus was not political but legal, and there was no way a member state of the Council of Europe could avoid execution of the judgments of the Court.

In a landmark 1995 decision, the European Court of Human Rights ordered Turkey to pay Loizidou, a Greek Cypriot refugee, $900,000 in compensation for denying her access to her land in occupied Kyrenia since 1974.

Turkey has yet to comply with the decision, despite two subsequent resolutions from the CoE demanding that it do so. In its third resolution passed on Tuesday in Strasbourg, the CoE said Ankara's refusal to execute the judgment of the Court demonstrated a manifest disregard for its international obligations.

And in an implicit threat of expulsion from the CoE, the resolution warned Turkey that implementation of ECHR decisions was a requirement for membership of the organisation.

Ankara earlier this year submitted a proposal to the CoE that suggested she only pay up on the Loizidou settlement after a Cyprus settlement.

But Schwimmer told a news conference yesterday that the execution of the judgment should not wait for a settlement of the Cyprus question. He described the third resolution as "a step to put pressure on a member country to comply with the judgment".

The resolution stresses the Committee's resolve to ensure by all means available to the organisation Turkey's compliance with its obligations under this judgment, and calls upon the authorities of member states to "take such actions as they deem appropriate to this end".

"If a country refuses to execute a judgment, this could lead to political tensions", Schwimmer said.

"The judgment is a purely legal question and not a political matter and has to be executed and not wait for the solution of the Cyprus problem." The Court does not deal with political issues, he added.

Schwimmer said he had discussed this issue during a recent meeting with Turkish Foreign Minister Ismail Cem, in which he made it clear that Turkey had to comply with the judgment.

The government said yesterday it was satisfied with the decision and that the latest resolution was stronger than the previous two. Government spokesman Michalis Papapetrou said it was obvious Turkey's isolation on the issue was growing bigger.

Attorney-general Alecos Markides said Turkey was now in a difficult position and added that it was important that all CoE member countries had been asked to take any action they deemed fit to put pressure on Ankara.

"This is first time such a stipulation was made in a resolution by the Committee of Ministers and this is why it is so important," Markides said.

He admitted, however, that the stipulation was rather general and abstract. 'You could say it is a bit of a riddle," he said. "But on the other hand with a good strategy someone can build on this paragraph, which creates a kind of road for us, and it's up to us to turn this into an avenue."

Markides said it would not be fair to speculate on what one country or another could do to put pressure on Turkey.

"The essence is that all members have been urged to take such measures as they deem fit to force Turkey to pay the compensation," he said. "There is no issue of us taking a whip and starting to lash people. We have a resolution, which confirms the difficult position Turkey is in. She is alone with 42 countries insisting that she has to enforce a basic obligation she had assumed as a member of the CoE."

Diplomatic sources said yesterday they were studying the context and implications of the resolution. "But they have definitely upped the ante and for the first time there is a hint of a suspension," the source said.

Turkish Cypriot papers yesterday reported "indignation" over the resolution in the north.

The Turkish Cypriot 'Foreign Ministry' said the breakaway regime was not under Turkey's control and was a sovereign state in its own right.

An announcement said Cyprus was not a regular member of the CoE as it was a "fake government" and that the EHCR had lost its credibility when it viewed the Loizidou case "as if Loizidou lived in a regular country".

"It is impossible to separate the human rights issues from the political dimension in the Cyprus problem," the announcement said. "The Turkish Cypriot people are indignant at the CoE for continuing to view Turkey as its interlocutor in the Loizidou case, even though it knows that Turkey cannot abide by the ruling."

The Turkish Foreign Ministry also rejected the latest resolution, saying the decision ignored the exceptional characteristics of the case. "We hope the committee would prefer to try in the future to make a positive contribution to efforts to find a solution by taking into consideration the issue's exceptional dimensions," a statement said. It added that Turkey was determined to protect the main principles of the CoE and to prevent these principles from being a tool for political goals.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2001

[05] Officials play down water contamination problems

THE BAD NEWS is that a quarter of all drinking water samples tested last year turned out to be unsuitable. The good news is that regular public health department checks mean most water contamination problems are corrected within a matter of days.

State lab tests carried out last year showed that 25.7 per cent of piped and bottled drinking water samples contained high levels of faecal and other bacteria. Drinking such water could cause stomach upsets, diarrhoea or even more serious health problems.

A further 12.7 per cent of drinking water samples contained what was classified as "suspect bacterial content", not as dangerous as the unacceptable levels in the 25.7 per cent, but still risky. Only 61.6 per cent of tested samples got the all clear, according to the State lab report for 2000, details of which were publicised by Politis newspaper earlier this week.

According to the report, a total of some 2,044 drinking water samples were tested over the year. The tests covered 437 batches of bottled water, both imported and locally bottled. Ten of these batches (six local and four imported) were deemed unsuitable and withdrawn from shop shelves. But the biggest problem was with piped water, which accounted for most of the 25 per cent of unsuitable samples.

While not denying that the test results were worrying, the public health department yesterday pointed out that most problems with domestic water supply quality were dealt with swiftly, thanks to regular checks carried out by health inspectors.

"We take the samples and get them to the lab, which gives us the results by telephone. Where there is any kind of problem, the inspectors immediately investigate it and the necessary chlorination or other measures are carried out," a senior public health department official told the Cyprus Mail yesterday.

"As soon as we get the results from the lab, we act at once and repeat the sampling in the next few days,"

All water supplies were checked at least once every two months, and most every month, the health inspector said.

"There is a programme for sampling - we cover large communities once a month and very small communities once every two months," he said.

The state lab needs two days to test samples, so any contamination problem can be tackled with within three days of a sample being taken. A community would only run a serious health risk if a bacteriological problem cropped up soon after a sampling date and was not identified till the next checking date, a month or two later. But the public health official said the frequency of sampling was "well within" the guidelines set by the EU.

Years of over-pumping from boreholes is known to have affected the quality of the island's groundwater supplies, either by allowing sea water to creep into coastal aquifers or by increasing the concentration of contaminants.

The Geological Survey department recently launched a four-year study of the state of the country's aquifers, hoping to quantify the extent of the over- pumping and contamination problem. The first results of the study suggest the problem is indeed acute, the department says.

The government recently also commissioned a team of British experts to study nitrate pollution in groundwater. Heavy use of artificial fertilisers is the main source of nitrate contamination in borehole water.

Earlier in week, Politis newspaper revealed state lab findings that 15 per cent of locally grown fruit and vegetables contained traces of between two and five pesticides. Some 14 per cent of local produce contained pesticides classified as carcinogens, the lab found.

Agriculture Minister Costas Themistocleous said the government was keen to clamp down on over-use of pesticides. He added that pesticide residues in peoples' food were not as high as they were in previous years.

DIKO yesterday called on the government to take immediate steps to reduce pesticide levels in fresh produce and to set up a food safety council with responsibility for such matters.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2001

[06] An end to compulsory voting?

ELECTIONS service chief George Theodorou yesterday told the House refugee committee that voting should become optional from 2004.

Voting in elections is currently compulsory - failing to cast your vote is punishable by a fine of up to £200.

Theodorou told the committee that the trend in Europe was towards non- obligatory voting.

The elections official added that municipal elections would take place in December, with elections for the Pancyprian refugee committee taking place a week later.

DISY deputy Chrystrodoulos Taramoundas claimed before the committee that the refugee elections were illegal. He said the constitution only provided for Presidential, parliamentary and municipal elections.

Taramoundas said his party would be tabling an amendment to end refugee elections. The proposed law change will be discussed by the committee on July 4.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2001

[07] Staff call off Development Bank strike

STAFF at the Development Bank yesterday got back to work after striking for two weeks in protest at being left in the dark about a deal to sell off part of the company.

The bank's bosses yesterday handed employees, who are members of bank workers union ETYK, the text of the agreement to sell off 38 per cent of the bank's share capital to Greece's Piraeus Bank.

The agreement will reduce the government's stake in the Development Bank from 88 to 45 per cent. Currently the minor shareholder is the European Investment Bank. The government announced the agreement in late April.

After issuing a warning last week that the employees would consider escalating the protest measures, ETYK secretary-general Loizos Hadjicostis said yesterday that the union was satisfied with the terms of the deal.

Hadjicostis said that the bank's staff had been reassured that they would receive five per cent of the shares, as the deal provided for.

The buy-up will cost the Piraeus Bank £27.9 million for 37.8 per cent of the Development Bank's share capital. The agreement with the government also provides for the Development Bank's flotation on the stock market in Cyprus, Greece or elsewhere, expanding the institution's operations beyond investment.

Barring the unexpected, the deal will be closed any day, after Piraeus Bank gets the approval of the Greek Central Bank.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2001

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