Cyprus Mail: News Articles in English, 02-01-10

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

Thursday, January 10, 2002

CONTENTS

[01] Georgiades jailed for sex offences on young girls

[02] Report on terror given to the UN

[03] Work goes on to free grounded tanker

[04] Collision kills driver, 80

[05] So what's the alternative?

[06] Squabbles over EU accession drag on

[07] Man held after bomb attempt

[08] Shipping Department prepares its own report on Castor scare

[09] CSE registers a positive blip

[10] Ancient cemetery yields important pottery finds

[11] Business chiefs await green light for meeting in north

[01] Georgiades jailed for sex offences on young girls

MUSICIAN and composer Doros Georgiades was yesterday sentenced to two and half years in jail after he was found guilty of indecent assault against five under-aged girls.

Under a new law, passed last year, the maximum sentence on each charge is 14 years in prison, but he was tried under the old law because of when the offences were committed.

Georgiades, a father of two, was found guilty on five counts and acquitted on a sixth after the court deemed testimony on that charge to be unreliable.

The offences were committed between 1988 and 1998 at his recording studio in Nicosia.

Georgiades was arrested in August last year after the grandfather of one of the girls told a TV reporter about the case before committing suicide.

Georgiades denied the charges, claiming they were a conspiracy to destroy him.

The court, which tried the case behind closed doors and banned any information from the proceedings from being made public, rejected Georgiades' claims and found him guilty of indecent assault against five girls aged between 10 and 15.

The court also rejected defence claims that the witnesses had been led by the prosecution and that Georgiades' right to a fair trial had been prejudiced by media publicity.

Georgiades received sentences of one year, two months, nine months, three months, and six months respectively on each of the five charges. The court said the two-month sentence would run concurrently with the one-year sentence.

The father of one of his victims said yesterday the sentence was not harsh enough: "We are not satisfied with the sentence; these are serious offences and two and half years are not enough."

The father, whose daughter was around 13 when she was assaulted by Georgiades, said such "offences against minors should carry over 10 years in jail -- two and a half years is a joke".

Under a new law on the sexual exploitation of minors, passed in March last year, similar offences carry a maximum prison sentence of 14 years. But Georgiades was tried under the old law, because his offences were carried out when that law was in effect.

The old law did not make a distinction between the age of the victims; thus in the court's decision his victims were referred to as "women".

The father said his daughter would carry the trauma of the assault for the rest of her life.

"She will never get over it," he said. "No one can understand what she's going through."

The man said there had been no conspiracy against Georgiades: "The girls don't know each other and they have different ages and it happened at different times. How can there be a conspiracy? No way."

He said many girls had wanted to testify but they were now married or engaged and were afraid of public exposure.

"But my daughter was determined; she didn't care if the whole island saw her face," he said. "The guilty must be punished."

Georgiades' wife, who on Monday when the guilty verdict was announced said her husband was innocent and that they would appeal, had nothing to say to waiting reporters yesterday.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[02] Report on terror given to the UN

THE government has submitted a 24-page report on the fight against terrorism to the United Nations, saying it is "committed to joining force with all governments... in the struggle to eliminate terrorism".

Cyprus has agreed to ten of the 12 international conventions on terrorism, and stressed in the report that the fight against terror is among its top foreign policy priorities.

The report details measures taken to prevent acts of terrorism and their financing. It also includes legislative procedures to freeze accounts and assets at financial institutions found to be supporting terrorist activity. Details of the penalties are also contained in the report: these include 15 years' imprisonment and / or a £1 million fine.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[03] Work goes on to free grounded tanker

THE Cyprus-registered 3,000-tonne petrol tanker MT Willy is to be towed to Falmouth in Cornwall once she has been freed from rocks where she grounded nine days ago, Britain's Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) said yesterday.

Salvage experts were yesterday continuing to prepare the ship to be towed by tugs off the rock shelf at Cawsand Bay, east Cornwall. It is hoped that the operation can take place tomorrow.

The grounding of the vessel, after she dragged her anchor in a gale near midnight on New Year's Day, caused a two-night evacuation of 150 local people because of explosion fears from her empty but vapour-filled tanks.

The 1981-built vessel, whose 12 crew escaped unhurt, was carrying 93 tonnes of intermediate fuel oil, 41 tonnes of gas oil and five tonnes of lubricating oil when she grounded near the coastal villages of Cawsand and Kingsand.

The MCA said yesterday work was continuing to remove oil from the vessel. (PA)

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[04] Collision kills driver, 80

POLICE are trying to determine the circumstances of a traffic accident yesterday on the Aradippou-Dhekelia motorway in which an 80-year-old man was killed.

Kyriakos Savvides, from Larnaca, is thought to have entered the wrong lane from the Troulli flyover and collided head-on with a car driven by Christos Hadji-adamou, a 50-year-old refugee from Kyrenia, who was heading towards Aradippou.

Savvides was declared dead on arrival at hospital. Hadji-adamou was seriously injured in the crash.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[05] So what's the alternative?

ALTERNATIVE therapists will gather in Limassol at the beginning of February for a two-day conference on 'Mind, Body, Spirit'.

Topics to be discussed will include reflexology, acupuncture, colour therapy and aromatherapy, plus other New Age concepts related to yoga and astrology.

More than 50 participants, both foreign and Cypriot, will give classes, lectures, and talks on their various fields of expertise.

Internationally acclaimed spiritual healer Soozi Holbeche, author of Awakening to Change and The Power of Gemstones and Crystals, will be one of the guest speakers.

Admission to the conference, which is at the Navarria Hotel on February 2 and 3, is £2.

For more information, e-mail cyprusspirit@yahoo.com_

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[06] Squabbles over EU accession drag on

THE GOVERNMENT yesterday reiterated that Cyprus would be joining the EU as a whole and not as government-controlled areas as bickering over the matter entered its third day.

The debate was sparked by a statement made by left-wing AKEL spokesman Nicos Katsourides who suggested Cyprus' accession should be postponed if joining the Union meant partition of the island.

Katsourides was responding to Turkish threats to annex the occupied north in the case of Cyprus joining the EU before a solution was found.

Foreign minister Ioannis Cassoulides reacted angrily to Katsourides' statement arguing that Turkish threats could not ruin Cyprus' plans to join the block.

"If the EU suggests that Cyprus should become a member as government- controlled areas instead of as a whole then we shall reply: 'No thank you, '" said the minister.

Ruling DISY chairman Nicos Anastassiades said Cassoulides' reaction had not been strong enough and accused him of undermining EU decisions regarding Cyprus' accession.

Attorney-General Alecos Markides yesterday said that Cyprus' accession in the EU as government-controlled areas had never been an issue. He further stressed the accession negotiations were being conducted between the EU and the "internationally recognised Republic of Cyprus," - therefore cementing the country's entry as a whole.

"We are examining possible problems which might occur in case the accession comes before a solution," he added.

Markides said the legal service had come up with ways of dealing with those problems without jeopardising Cyprus' sovereign rights.

"Negotiations with the EU are conducted with governments that have an international representation and not with maps that have been drawn by invaders," Foreign minister Ioannis Cassoulides said yesterday.

"The accession of half of the island has never been on the cards," he added.

Katsourides yesterday clarified that his statement expressed his personal views and not those of his party.

"If, at the time of the accession, Turkey goes ahead with annexing the occupied north and there is no reaction from the international community as a result of Greek Cypriot handlings the whole issue will have to be readdressed," he said.

Katsourides said the matter was "an existing reality" and that he had raised the issue to make people think.

Government spokesman Michalis Papapetrou yesterday accused Katsourides of re-wording his original statement.

"What Katsourides said was that he would not hesitate to suggest a postponement of the accession if Turkish threats persist."

Papapetrou added that he was relieved to hear that the spokesman was expressing his personal opinion and not the official AKEL stance. He went on to say that the EU had branded Turkish threats as unacceptable and "warned Turkey that if it dares to carry them out it will kill its European plans."

Socialist KISOS chairman Yiannakis Omirou yesterday said the quarrel between Katsourides and the government was "a fight with shadows."

"We are negotiating with ourselves without a reason and without a cause," he said.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[07] Man held after bomb attempt

POLICE yesterday arrested a Limassol man in connection with an attempted bombing at the Crash Café in the Enaerios area. The suspect denies any involvement.

Police said that at 3am yesterday a security guard, patrolling the shops in the area, and who was in the café at that time, saw a car with two people in it stopping outside the Crash Café.

The passenger got out of the car and carried a suspicious-looking object to the entrance, and was seen trying to light it.

He was chased by the security guard but got into the car and sped off.

Police were called and found that the object to be a home-made high explosive device.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[08] Shipping Department prepares its own report on Castor scare

THE ILL-FATED Cypriot-flagged tanker Castor was back in the news yesterday just over a year after it nearly split in half in the Mediterranean.

According to shipping newspaper Lloyd's List, the Merchant Shipping Department is preparing a separate report on the incident.

The Greek-owned 30.577-tonne Castor, carrying an explosive cargo of 23, 000 tonnes of unleaded petrol, sought shelter in the western Mediterranean on December 31, 2000 when its crew reported a serious crack in the deck.

Fears that the petrol might ignite prompted several countries in the western Mediterranean, including Spain, Gibraltar and Morocco, to refuse it shelter to carry out the salvage operation.

After slowly sailing around the Mediterranean for 40 days, the ship's cargo was eventually transferred to another tanker at sea and the vessel was taken to Piraeus in Greece.

Lloyd's List said the move by the Merchant Shipping Department to issue its own report on the Castor incident caught many off-guard as the flag had co-operated closely with the ship's classification society -- the American Bureau of Shipping (ABS) -- in the technical investigation into the cause of the accident.While Cyprus and ABS were to have jointly issued the final report, ABS released a final version lacking an outright endorsement by the Cyprus authorities. "The Cyprus flag authorities have somewhat built a reputation of taking class societies to task in recent years as they strive to tighten up control over their fleet," the newspaper said.The Cypriot report is said to incorporate ABS's technical report in its entirety, but will go further by offering additional comments and recommendations, including a focus on the survey history of the vessel.The ABS technical report concluded that the damage was a result of massively accelerated corrosion, or 'super-rust'. Among its recommendations, the ABS said both its own and the International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) standards should be amended to reflect the severity of this hyper-corrosion, Lloyd's List said.The ABS has admitted that in two earlier surveys -- one a year prior and the other just over four months before the accident -- it had failed to detect excessive corrosion.

Captain Andreas Constantinou, senior surveyor at the Shipping Department, told the newspaper that the government was pleased with the ABS report but wanted to further elaborate on "certain dimensions including the survey history of the vessel".

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[09] CSE registers a positive blip

CYPRUS stocks registered a 0.26 per cent rise yesterday following a turbulent session which left the all-share index at 132.2 points.

The blue chips FTSE/CySE index ended the day 0.66 per cent up at 534.4 points, but volume stood at only £1.64 million.

Trading opened lower than Tuesday's close, but the index managed to drag itself up in the first hour only to drop again before snaking to a positive close.

"The cold weather is not encouraging investors, but in any case there isn't much money about," said one Nicosia broker. "Also investors are waiting to see the companies' annual results before positioning themselves, and I'm not sure the results in most cases will be encouraging either."

Losing sub sectors yesterday included investment, which fell 0.08 per cent, and fish companies, which shed 1.66 per cent. Gainers included the manufacturing sector, which added 0.43 per cent, while the insurance sector rose 2.16 per cent.

Information technology companies also recorded a respectable rise of 1.71 per cent, while the banking sector added 0.59 per cent. Bank of Cyprus topped the most-active list, gaining two cents to £1.95.

Overall 42 titles recorded gains compared to 40 decliners and 55 that closed unchanged.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[10] Ancient cemetery yields important pottery finds

ARCHAEOLOGISTS have uncovered the earliest known imported pieces of ancient coloured pottery to Cyprus during excavations at Souskiou-Laona in the Paphos district.

The cemetery site dates to the Middle Chalcolithic period, around 2800- 3400BC, the Antiquities Department said yesterday.

It said the excavation would shed light on the layout of Chalcolithic cemeteries in Cyprus since these types of burial were extremely rare and most such tombs were looted long ago.

Archaeologists believe that finds overlooked by looters will provide extra information enabling them to associate the pottery artifacts with skeletal remains and architectural types.

So far about a third of the visible cemetery has been excavated, and a total of 42 tombs have been discovered. They are very close together: in one area, there is one tomb per two square metres.

The excavations were carried out with the participation of the University of Edinburgh.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

[11] Business chiefs await green light for meeting in north

THE CYPRUS Chamber of Commerce (KEVE) is still waiting to hear whether a planned meeting with its Turkish Cypriot counterparts will go ahead in the occupied areas this winter.

The Turkish Cypriots extended an invitation to a meeting in the north following two successful bi-communal events -- one in Brussels under the aegis of the European Union and another in the free areas on December 19.

The flurry of activity comes after 10 years of deadlock and a new Turkish Cypriot administration more amenable to rapprochement with Greek Cypriot business leaders.

At the forthcoming meeting it is hoped to discuss specific projects that would benefit from an EU grant of 1.5 million euros to help Greek and Turkish entrepreneurs fund bi-communal programmes.

The fund was earmarked when the two sides met in Brussels on November 29 at the invitation of the European Commissioner for Enlargement, Gunter Verheugen.

European technocrats are to help the Turkish Cypriot Chamber of Commerce set up a European Commission information centre similar to the one operated by KEVE.

Turkish Cypriot members crossed to the south for the first time in 10 years on December 19 to attend the KEVE annual general meeting at the International Conference Centre in Nicosia.

The AGM was followed by KEVE's 75th birthday party, where the Turkish Cypriot delegates met President Glafcos Clerides.

The Turkish Cypriot office then put forward a list of dates to KEVE for a trip to the north, but none was suitable to all the members of the KEVE executive committee. They have now suggested their own list of dates in order that all members can attend.

They are currently waiting for an answer.

"Our previous meetings were very successful and that's why we hope there will be a third meeting," KEVE chairman Vassilis Rologis told the Cyprus Mail yesterday.

KEVE was set up in 1927 and the Turkish Cypriot equivalent in 1958.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2002

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