Pallets with 50% more supplies than first boat, Open Arms, being loaded in Cyprus
The charity sending food aid to Gaza on a ship travelling across the Mediterranean from Cyprus is loading a second boat with supplies, which it hopes will set off in the coming days.
Pallets containing 300 tonnes of food aid – 50% more than the first shipment – are expected to be screened and loaded by the end of Thursday, but there is no indication yet when it will leave the port of Larnaca.
Continue reading...Charity ship seen sailing out of Larnaca towing barge containing 200 tonnes of flour, rice and protein
An aid ship that has been docked in Cyprus for close to a month has finally set sail for Gaza, taking almost 200 tonnes of aid in a pilot project to open a new sea route for aid to a population on the brink of famine.
A video showed the Open Arms boat departing the Mediterranean island’s southern port of Larnaca at an unknown time early on Tuesday. Government officials in Cyprus had said the exact timing of the vessel’s departure would not be released for security reasons.
Continue reading...Vessel carrying 200 tonnes of provisions to alleviate looming famine now not sailing from Larnaca on Sunday as planned
An aid ship carrying 200 tonnes of food to alleviate looming famine in the Gaza Strip remained docked in Cyprus on Sunday night, despite the push for maritime aid in the face of stalling ceasefire talks and the beginning of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
The Cyprus government spokesperson, Konstantinos Letymbiotis, told the island’s official news agency that the exact timing of the vessel’s departure would not be made public for “security reasons”. It was later reported that due to “technical difficulties”, it might not depart until Monday morning.
Continue reading...Open Arms vessel, loaded with humanitarian supplies, is waiting for approval from Israel before leaving
A Gaza-bound aid ship expected to make the maiden voyage along a new maritime corridor from Cyprus has yet to set sail because of logistical challenges.
Government officials confirmed on Saturday that while a vessel belonging to Open Arms, a Spanish search and rescue group, had been loaded with food, water and other supplies and was ready to depart the Mediterranean island, it was unlikely to leave before Sunday.
Continue reading...‘You need drivers, trucks and a distribution system that doesn’t exist,’ says president of Refugees International aid advocacy group
The US plan to build a floating port off the Gaza coast is a bold move, reminiscent of the Mulberry harbours built after D-day in Normandy, but there are serious concerns that what relief it brings will be too little too late for Palestinians facing starvation.
“When we talk about the sea route, it’s going to take weeks to set up and we are talking about a population that is starving now. We have already seen children dying of hunger,” said Ziad Issa, the head of humanitarian policy at the ActionAid charity.
Continue reading...Report links rise in birds trapped for human consumption to cuts in anti-poaching resources in area of British military base
More than 400,000 songbirds were trapped and killed in Cyprus last autumn as part of a recent increase in wildlife crime, according to a new report.
Organised crime networks use decoys and speakers playing birdsong to lure these small birds – including garden favourites such as robins and sparrows – to land in bushes or orchards, where they catch them with “mist” nets or branches covered in glue. They are then sold via the hidden market to restaurants to be eaten as a local dish called “ambelopoulia”, which consists of pickled or boiled songbirds.
Continue reading...President accused of allowing country to become a target because of ‘complicity in bloodshed of Gaza’
The Cyprus government is facing growing criticism over British military bases on the island being used by UK and US forces to stage airstrikes on Iran-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.
President Nicos Christodoulides has been accused by activists of turning a blind eye to the risks the EU’s most easterly state might confront if the strategic facilities on the island continue to be deployed in military operations.
Continue reading...Hearing in Adiyaman involves 11 defendants accused of ‘conscious negligence’ while overseeing building’s construction
Turkey has opened the first major trial linked to the construction of buildings that crumbled in two earthquakes last year that claimed more than 50,000 lives.
The hearing in the south-eastern city of Adiyaman involves 11 defendants accused of “conscious negligence” while overseeing the construction of the Isias hotel.
Continue reading...Cypriot government and EU respond to revelations over apparent role of local companies in helping oligarchs shield wealth
The Cyprus police force is investigating how an oligarch attempted to transfer a £1bn stake in a public company on the day he was placed under EU sanctions, government insiders have told the Guardian.
News of the involvement of the financial crime squad came as the Cypriot government and the European Union responded to revelations that local service providers appear to have played a key role in enabling Russian oligarchs to shield assets from EU sanctions within days of Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Continue reading...Petr Aven, a UK-based billionaire who owns a Surrey mansion, is under UK and EU sanctions
He is a billionaire Russian oligarch who has been closely linked to Vladimir Putin for three decades.
And for years Petr Aven also enjoyed the trappings of London high society, as a trustee and donor of the Royal Academy of Arts, as well as owning three multimillion-pound UK properties, including one in the ultra-wealthy Surrey enclave of Virginia Water.
Continue reading...Biggest ever leak of financial data from Cyprus raises concerns over EU state’s role in managing Russian fortunes
Cyprus has vowed to tighten controls on its financial sector as an investigation published by the Guardian and its reporting partners reveals oligarchs transferred hundreds of millions in assets while sanctions loomed after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The role of the blue-chip accountants PwC Cyprus and other advisers in managing transactions as Vladimir Putin’s forces launched their assault has emerged from Cyprus Confidential, a cache of 3.6m files leaked by an anonymous source to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and Germany’s Paper Trail Media, which shared access with the Guardian and other reporting partners.
Continue reading...Alleged victim says she was sexually assaulted by a group of Israeli men while on holiday in Ayia Napa
A group of young Israeli men have been detained in Cyprus after local police said they needed time to investigate accusations of gang-rape from a British woman on holiday in Ayia Napa.
The five men, all aged 19 or 20, were remanded on order of a district court magistrate in Famagusta for a further eight days after their arrest late on Sunday. The Briton, who is 20 and cannot legally be identified, told police she had been sexually assaulted by the Israelis after being “taken by force” from the pool area of her hotel to her room.
Continue reading...British man found not guilty of murdering wife faces further legal proceedings and possibility of jail
A British pensioner found not guilty of the premeditated murder of his cancer-stricken wife faces further legal proceedings – and potentially jail – after Cyprus’s highest legal authority appealed against the decision of a district court that allowed him to walk free.
In a shock move, initiated at the 11th hour, the office of the island’s attorney general announced on Thursday it would appeal against the sentence and acquittal of David Hunter.
Continue reading...Vets receive medication originally meant for people amid virulent feline coronavirus that has killed thousands of cats
Veterinary services in Cyprus have received a first batch of anti-Covid pills, from a stockpile originally meant for humans, as efforts intensify to stop the spread of a virulent strain of feline coronavirus that has killed thousands of cats.
The island’s health ministry began discharging the treatment on 8 August – long celebrated as International Cat Day – in what is hoped will be the beginning of the end of the disease that has struck the Mediterranean country’s feline population.
Continue reading...David Hunter, who denies premeditated murder, tells trial his wife Janice’s life had become unbearable
A euthanasia case that has gripped Cyprus for more than a year has entered its final phase as a British pensioner accused of murdering his cancer-stricken wife told how she “begged” him to end the excruciating pain that made her life unbearable.
David Hunter had waited a long time to have his day in court and in electrifying evidence before a three-member tribunal in Paphos on Monday, the 76-year-old described the circumstances that he said led him in the run-up to Christmas 2021 to fatally smother his wife, Janice, his teenage sweetheart and the woman he had loved for more than half a century.
In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or by emailing jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is at 988 or chat for support. You can also text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis text line counselor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org
Continue reading...Report details how local people and firms helped Alisher Usmanov’s conceal immense wealth
Cyprus has received an 800-page dossier from the US government detailing sanctions breaches by local individuals and entities that are alleged to have enabled the Russian billionaire, Alisher Usmanov, to conceal his immense wealth.
As the island’s leader Nikos Christodoulides vowed to push ahead with the prosecution of law and audit firms that had aided the oligarch, Washington released documents that amounted to a toolkit to facilitate the process. At least two other dossiers are expected to follow.
Continue reading...Island shuts 10,000 Russian bank accounts as US and UK put Cypriot lawyers and accountants under sanctions for enabling oligarchs including Roman Abramovich
Back-to-back meetings, an air of discernible panic, policymakers engaged in frantic damage limitation and Cyprus once again in the eye of a Russia-related storm. It’s been an unusually fraught fortnight for the Mediterranean island’s newly installed president, arduous in ways that Nikos Christodoulides might never have imagined when he assumed office on 1 March.
First came the news that 13 Cypriot entities and individuals had been placed on Anglo-American sanctions lists for enabling Russian oligarchs. The measures were aimed at dismantling the financial networks of Roman Abramovich and Alisher Usmanov, both close allies of Vladimir Putin. Overnight, bank accounts and other assets belonging to their alleged “financial fixers” were frozen.
Continue reading...Defence team had argued David Hunter’s confession should be ruled inadmissible as evidence in trial
A court in Cyprus has ruled that the confession of a retired Northumberland coalminer accused of murdering his terminally ill wife was obtained lawfully and can be used in evidence against him.
In what will amount to a major setback for David Hunter, 75, who has campaigned to be tried on the lesser charge of manslaughter, Judge Michalis Droussiotis announced that statements of admission made by the Briton were admissible.
Continue reading...Former foreign minister, who ran as independent, was backed by groups hostile to talks on island’s reunification
Nikos Christodoulides, a former foreign minister, has been elected the eighth president of Cyprus, beating the career diplomat Andreas Mavroyiannis in a high-stakes, closely fought race.
Christodoulides, 49, won 51.92 per cent of the vote compared with 48.09 per cent for his opponent, who had been backed by the leftist party AKEL. A mere 15,041 ballots had divided the loser from the winner.
Continue reading...Nikos Christodoulides emerges as frontrunner and will face Andreas Mavroyiannis in vote next Sunday
The race to become the eighth president of Cyprus will extend into a second week after the Mediterranean island’s former foreign minister Nikos Christodoulides emerged as the frontrunner but failed to gain enough support to win outright.
The 49-year-old independent will face Andreas Mavroyiannis, a veteran career diplomat backed by the leftist Akel party, in a runoff on 12 February.
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