Current Events

The island country of Cyprus may have its own problems, but that does not stop its people from taking part in the global community and care for the deprived. Demonstrating a rare act of kindness, Pastor Isaac Samuels II, the General overseer of the Jesus Inspiration Christian Commission (JICC), donated several materials to the Christian Association of the Blind in Liberia.

Held under the theme of “We Stand for Miracle”, the donation programme was held on the Christian Association of the Blind’s compound, which stands along the Robertsfield High Way.

The donated items were an assortment of different essential materials, including (but not limited to clothes, toys, soaps and tissue, vegetable oil and five bags of rice.

Speaking in an interview, Pastor Samuels explained the reason behind the initiative. According to the Pastor, the spirit of God inspired him to go all the way to Liberia and help the those who need them. Which in this case were the blind children.

The Pastor also explained how the deplorable condition of the children moved him to tears, seeing the effect of what happens when there is no one to take care of the young ones.

The General Overseer of JICC has said that the donation programme won’t be all – they have plans to build an orphanage so that they can provide a home to as many disadvantage young people as they possibly can.

An international church based in Nicosia, JICC is dedicated make lives better through “the word of God.” It is also involved with charity and helping the deprived all over the world.

The Police may have come out empty thus far, but that hasn’t stopped them from continuing their search for the reason behind Limassol’s mysterious death case.

The Police are currently to investigate the circumstances behind the death of an unidentified woman whose body was found floating near port in the old Limassol area.

According to the Police, the body of the woman, who is believed to be of 45-50 years of age, did not sustain any external injuries.

Local fishermen who had found the body floating on the water had initially brought it ashore on a Port Authority-owned boat. The woman’s purse was found on a nearby jetty. Also found was a mobile phone, which is currently being examined by forensic scientists.

In a rather rare turn of events, a car that recently reported as stolen along with its owner has been found in northern Cyprus.

The car, whose theft was reported by its owner, 65-year-old Solomos Apostolidis, was missing for over three days before being finally located in Karavas on Saturday.

Kibris, a Turkish Cypriot newspaper, has reported that the car was located in Karavas close to a military area. The car contained Mr. Apostolidis’ passport and card, along with some cash.

Apostolidis, who apparently had crossed over to north Cyprus via the Astromeritis crossing, was last seen spending time at a casino in Kyrenia

Kibris also took a statement from Apostolidis’ brother, who expressed his concern regarding the missing status of his brother. He went on to express his family’s concern for his life.

A missing person bulletin for Apostolidis has been lodged by the Police.

The US-led airstrikes on Russia has had repercussions all over the world, the Cyprus is no exception. In this case, though, it is the British who are wary of staying in the country as they fear a retaliation from Russia.

Such a reaction is only obvious since the tornado jets that had fired on Syrian chemical weapons centers flew from none other than RAF Akrotiri.

Cyprus has a noticeable British, with over 25,000 of them living on the island and more than 10,000 visiting on holiday annually.

According to a defense source, it is highly unlikely for the Russians to attack. A contingency plan to let people get out has been kept out regardless.

The Britons themselves aren’t all that confident, however, and are saying that they have very little trust in the defense’s statements. Their conviction is not entirely dumbfounded, given Russia’s not so subtle outrage on the matter. Anatoly Antonov, Russia’s US envoy recently warned that the Allied bombing raids “will not be left without consequences”.

In the meantime, chiefs of the Air traffic control system have warned possible “missile activity” in the Eastern Mediterranean.

Airlines too are exercising caution over the matter, with both Air France and EasyJet re-routing their flights.

In a shocking piece of news that shows the unfortunate rise of youth-perpetrated crime, a 17-year-old teenager has been arrested in connection to the sexual assault of a senior citizen.

The teenager, who has not been named for security reasons, has been arrested on grounds of allegedly raping and injuring an 81-year-old woman, and will be in custody for a minimum of five days.

Said incident, which took place in Nicosia in the evening, was reported by the victim’s husband, also 81. He gave the details of the assault, wherein that an unknown perpetrator broke into their house while he was away, and went on to rape and injure his wife. The woman sustained pelvic fractures and was transferred to Nicosia general hospital for treatment.

The arrested 17-year-old is currently being investigated, and if found guilty will be charged with break and entry, rape, sexual assault, as well as causing grievous bodily harm.

In what is being considered a big step by the FinTech community of Cyprus, the island country’s upcoming iCoin summit will be hosting the world’s first ever ICO battle. The event will entail a live investment, over thirty famous speakers, and 16 different blockchain start-ups, not to mention a grand prize worth $250,000.

The one-of-a-kind event will be sponsored by 7Marketz one of the biggest ICO companies and will be held on 8th and 9th May at Atlantica Oasis.

The event is the result of a rapidly developing ICO sector, which has called for a bigger demand for blockchain calls. A unique blend of learning and networking opportunity, the event will be held in Limassol, one of the biggest trading hubs of the world.

The iCoin Summit has garnered attention from a lot of places already, including (but not limited to) well-known blockchain publishers such as Webrazzi, CoinMarketCap, ICOwatchlist, and CoinTelegraph.

Participants of speeches and panel discussion include industry stalwarts such as Benjamin Biliski of NAGA Group (who was listed in Forbes 30 under 30) and Yagub Rahimov.

For more information and registration, and to book your seat as an attendee, visit www.icoinsummit.com.

The Cyprus issue has truly come to a head, and the latest move by the UN only proves that the international community at large wishes nothing less than unification. In order to speed-up the unification process, the United Nations peacekeeping mission will hold an unofficial meeting between the two factions of the divided island country on the 16th of April. According to a statement issued by the United Nations, the meeting will have leader of Greek and Turkish Cyprus Nicos Anastasiades and Mustafa Akinci respectively, who will be presided over by Elizabeth Spehar, UN Chief of Mission to Cyprus. The meeting itself will be held at Spehar’s residence in Cyprus.

Intended to be an icebreaker of sorts between the two divided factions, the upcoming meeting will be first time of the two rival leaders interacting since the botched high-level peace talks in Switzerland in July last year.

UN officials hope that the meeting will help both leaders re-engage after what appears to be several months of no interaction.

While both sides have agreed that the meeting is one that goes in a positive direction, it does not mean that it will actually make a tangible contribution in resolving the issue – or even resuming negotiations in the first place.

While the victims of Nicosia’s double murder incident have been laid to rest, the police are continuing their investigation into finding the murderer.

Giorgos Hadjigeorgiou, 60, English School maths teacher and his 59-year-old wife, Dina Sergiou, an employee of the Central bank were laid to rest in Strovolos, a little away from their home where they were found murdered.

According to the post-mortem, Hadjigeorgiou had been stabbed at least 25 times while his wife received at least 10 blows. Both were found with a defensive wound on their right arm.

The couple is survived by their 15-year-old adopted son, who was also the sole witness. He says that two hooded people had forcefully entered the house and told him that they would not hurt him. He panicked and fled and finally took shelter in a neighboring house.

The Police, on the other hand, have not found any sign of forced entry and/or robbery and have not found the murder weapon either.

Andreas Angelides, police spokesman has assured the Police’s intentions to stay put on the case, saying that the investigation procedure will not stop until the murderer is found and arrested.

The manufacture and sale of fake diamonds in Cyprus has been on the rise, and recent events show that the case is in fact pretty widespread. A 34-year-old man has been arrested in relation to the sale of fake diamonds in Cyprus.

Apparently, the man, a resident of the island country, was involved in the sale, which was reported by a jeweler in Larnaca. The 34-year-old is now the second person who has been arrested for the case.

The first person to be arrested by the police was a 59-year-old man from Larnaca, who, according to the jeweler, had visited his shop and sold him 4 fake diamonds for a high-price of €44,000.

The jeweler, who felt unsure about the nature of the diamonds only found out the truth after showing the diamonds to a gemstone expert, who confirmed that they were in fact fake and shouldn’t have been sold for anything more than €2,500.

Crime has been on the rise in Cyprus, and the latest event only seems to affirm that fact. A successful bakery in Nicosia was robbed by a knife-yielding man, terrorizing the employees and the owners.

A man yielding a knife entered the popular Larnaca bakery at around 12.30 am, and forced the employees to open the cash registers. No sooner has they done that, he took all the cash and left. While it is known that he took a lot of cash, the exact amount is yet to be known.

While the man could not be completely identified (he has a cloth covering his face), the two employees present at the scene described him as a normal-built, 1.80 meters tall man, wearing black clothes. The man had covered his face with a red scarf.

Police are currently looking for the perpetrator’s whereabouts.

In what is being considered as good news for the population in Cyprus, the island country has seen a record rise in birth rates. According to the Statistical Service of Cyprus (CYSTAT), as of 2016, the total fertility rate in the island country stood at 1.37 children per woman in 2016.

Publishing its “Demographic Report 2016”, CYSTAT has stated that the birthrate in 2016 was 9.455, a welcome increase from 9.170 in 2015. Further information in the report revealed that the number of deaths in 2016 was 5.471 while the crude death rate remained at 6.4 deaths per thousand population.

All of this makes the expectancy rate as 84.7 years for females and 80.3 years for males.

Other information reveals the increase of marriages from 13.006 in 2015 to 13.558 in 2016. Cyprus residents’ marriages totaled 6.375 in 2016, from which of which 2.449 were civil and 3.926 were ecclesiastical. Also increased in 2016 were the number of divorces – going up from 1.807 in 2015 to 1.948 in 2016.

Russian biker Sergey Severin has completed a bike-ride all around Cyprus in only 3.5 days, setting a record in his area.

Covering a total distance of 600 kilometers, Sergey Severin started his Limassol at 6 am, and rode all along the island’s perimeter till he came back to his starting point.

The athlete he spent a total of 53 hours in the saddle and only took small breaks for sleeping and eating. Mr. Severin crossed the Green Line twice.

Mr. Severin had great things to say about the island nation, emphasizing how Cyprus remains a beautiful country even in the winter season, and that there are always a healthy amount of landscapes and opportunities for outdoor activities available all year.

He also added that while it was more of a timed challenge for him, one should take a week if they truly want to enjoy the scenery.

Mr Severin heads the Russian extreme PLAN X Adventure Team, and in 2015, had used his bicycle to cross the frozen Lake Baikal from its northern to southern tip.

In what can be considered a truly moving event for veterans and their families, hundreds of British Forces Cyprus personnel commemorated Bases Remembrance Day services by personally paying their respects to troops which have fought in conflicts in different parts of the world.

In a very moving gesture, hundreds of civilians, sailors, soldiers, and airmen attended services in Ayios Nikolaos, Episkopi, Akrotiri, and Dhekelia – laying wreaths and bowing their heads to commemorate the sacrifice made by military personnel in the name of their country.

Attending the services in Dhekelia, Major General James Illingworth, Commander British Forces Cyprus, gave the crowd a moral impetus, emphasizing how everyone was there to honor the courage and sacrifice made by generations of men and women in the British service who have their lives to protect the very freedoms that is being enjoyed at this date.

Also present at the event were spouses and children of military personnel. Many children paraded in their guides and scouts uniforms. Scores of ex-service personnel organizations also showed up at the event.

In a disappointing piece of news for both Cyprus and Cyprus-Fiji relations, two Cyprus nationals have been jointly charged with 293 counts of money laundering as well as attempting to garner property by deceiving people in the island country of Fiji.

FijiVillage, a local newspaper, has reported that Loizos Petridis and Cleanthis Petridis have been arrested due on grounds of their alleged involvement in multiple suspicious ATM transactions. The two will be further remanded in custody till further investigations.

According to the report, while the two men were originally jointly charged with 6 counts of money laundering worth $3,060, the police actually found and seized money worth $150,000.

The two will be tried before court on the 16th of next month.

In what may turn out to be great news for both national and international law enforcement and the justice system in general, a man has been arrested by Cyprus police, who suspect that he is in fact a wanted trafficker in human organs.

Moshe Harel, an Israeli national has been arrested and is currently facing extradition to Kosovo, where he has been accused of illegally luring kidney donors from the ex-Soviet Union and Turkey over 10 years ago.

Baki Kelani, a spokesman for Kosovo police, recently told Reuters that the suspect “M.H.” has been arrested in the island country on the basis of an international arrest warrant. The man has been on their most wanted person since 2010.

According to the policer’s report, Harel lured donors by promising them up to $14,500 in payment, sold the extracted organs being sold to Israelis for prices that went as high as $120,000. Additionally, Harel reportedly did not pay some of the donors at all.

International arrest warrants for Harel were issued by both Russia and the Interpol. The Kosovan authorities are currently requesting his extradition.

Kosovo is a Serbian province which despite having declared independence in 2008, continued to be unrecognized as a separate entity, both by the UN and by Cyprus.

Saipem 12000, the star drillship of energy giant ENI has left for Morocco, after being anchored off Limassol for refueling and equipment loading and unloading for over two days.

After failing to reach Cuttlefish target in Cyprus’ offshore plot 3 to drill an exploratory gas well for the second time, the Saipem 12000 began to prepare for its next destination and to that end, docked about 17 nautical miles off of Limassol. The three support vessels of the ship (namely Vos Prime, Vos Purpose and Vos Prudence) started to load and unload equipment at the Limassol port and began to arrange for refueling.

The Cyprus News Agency has announced that the Saipem left for Morocco at around midnight Monday.

Both the first and the second attempts of the vessel were thwarted by Turkish navy vessels over three weeks ago, with the latter having intercepted the former. After realizing that any attempts that would be made were futile, the Saipem finally docked off Limassol.

A spokesperson for ENI added that while they are disappointed about the cuttlefish incident, they intend to proceed with the rest of the plan as it were, and the drillship will therefore depart to its next destination as planned.

Cyprus has had a fantastic year as regards tourism arrival figures, and if Tourism Minister Giorgos Lakkotrypis’ words are anything to go by, this should be the third year for the island country in maintaining the coveted record.

According to Lakkotrypis, after last year’s record 3.6 million tourists, it definitely looks like Cyprus’ tourism sector will see another good year. He added that this was in part because of an increase in available airline seats to Cyprus and agreements made with foreign travel organizers.

Last year saw the island country having a 15% increase in tourism arrivals, with the proceeds reaching €2.6 billion by November 2017.

Lakkotrypis also added that while ‘sea and sun’ are very much an important part of Cyprus, the island destination does have more to it, which should be showcased in the best way possible. He mentioned that the government will be implementing its own national tourism-growth strategy, which is due to be launched soon. A revised bill to create a tourism secretariat is currently in the process of being sent to parliament.

Disorderliness has no exception, and the latest incident has proved that the country of Cyprus intends to make that very clear to all – citizens or not.

A drunk Swedish tourist was recently fined and asked to pay €400 by the Famagusta district court for being in possession of a collapsible baton, a sledgehammer and two knives. Said weapons were found by the Police in the man’s car once they stopped him for reckless driving in Protaras right before midnight.

According to the arresting and standby officers, the car was seen coming from the opposite direction of Protaras avenue. Not only did it have its headlights on, it was being driven at a dangerously greater speed, was overtaking other vehicles without any regard of the rules, drove right through a red traffic light.

After chasing and halting the car, the police found the 28-year-old tourist in the driver’s seat, smelling strongly of alcohol. The police arrested him, and after taking the breathalyzer test, found that the reading showed 60µg (as opposed to the permitted 22µg).

After being charged €300 by the Police for driving under the influence of alcohol and being arrested, the tourist was charged a fine of €400 by the district court and was only released after said fines were paid in full.

In a shocking news for the Ayia Napa community, a deadly fire completely gutted a local styling salon, and caused extensive damage to five shops adjacent to it. The fire has been ruled as an accidental fire, not caused by any deliberate action they can identify or tie to any individual(s).

Starting at the beauty salon on Nissi Ave. around 4 in the morning; the fire spread rapidly to the clothes shop, a souvenir shop and an ice cream parlor.

The fire was brought under control by the fire department at around 6.30am – about two and a half hours after it started.

According to Andreas Constantinou, a spokesman for the Famagusta police, all stores were covered by an insurance policy, with the hair salon being the only exception.

According to the authorities, the cause of the blaze was an electrical fault. Any intentional act of arson has been ruled out.

Marios Demetriades, the Transport Minister of Cyprus has announced that two of the bids for the development of the port and marina in Larnaca from Israel and China will be submitted latest by the end of April.

This announcement came after a meeting between Demetriades and Mayor Andreas Vyras, with the latter expressing his wish to see the end of the development process of the port and marina before the end of his term. He did express his happiness at seeing the process be near its completion, before saying how he firmly believed the project could very well be implemented with the right amount of patience and persistence.

Demetriades added that the aim here is not to have the state earn from said deals and developments but to create a better infrastructure project which will be of great benefit to the city.

About the tender process itself, he said that the respective interested companies have each asked for their deadline to be extended from the original March 16.

Mayor Vyras too had nothing but good words to say about the project, calling it an essentially important one, which is directly related to the city’s economic growth and is instrumental in sending for new investments.”