Cyprus Mail: News Articles in English, 03-06-22

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

Sunday, June 22, 2003

CONTENTS

[01] Ticket seller’s death ‘was an accident’

[02] Cyprus doctors appalled at situation in Iraq

[03] CSE counters bad press for the Med 100

[04] CY’s Hellas Jet launch delayed

[05] Harry’s here and local fans are happy

[01] Ticket seller’s death ‘was an accident’

THE lottery ticket seller whose body was retrieved from Limassol harbour on Friday morning died from asphyxia due to drowning, state pathologist Eleni Antoniou said yesterday.

Eighty-six-year-old Andreas Parpas’ death was accidental, she said. There was no evidence that a crime had been committed or that he had committed suicide.

“We were told that he used to buy fish there every Monday and sell lottery tickets. That particular day was a wet one and it appears his car slipped forward down the slight slope and plunged into the water with him in it, with his window slightly open,” she said.

Parpas had been reported missing by his family on December 9 last year. They feared he had been murdered for the £3,000 he had been carrying at the time. But police, who retrieved the car after Greek Navy frogmen found it lying on the harbour’s seabed on Thursday night, found the money in his car.

Although he had not been wearing a seatbelt, he was too old to save himself, said Antoniou.

“Opening the car door, in order to break free, would have been impossible even for a young man to achieve because of the pressure exerted on the door in that depth of water,” she added.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2003

Sunday, June 22, 2003

[02] Cyprus doctors appalled at situation in Iraq

THE IRAQI people are living in decrepit conditions, members of the Cyprus branch of ‘Doctors of the World’ said yesterday on their return from a seven-day humanitarian mission to Iraq.

A small party of doctors, Kykkos monastery clergy and volunteers distributed food and medical supplies that had been collected in a humanitarian campaign undertaken by several organisations and companies including the government, DIAS group, Sigma television channel, the Church and political parties.

The organisation said it had distributed the supplies, but that the Iraqi people’s needs continue to be immense.

“Their needs remain huge and their infectious diseases are incurable and thus on the increase. Children with cancer are not able to receive the proper therapy and so die without the slightest chance of treatment,” the Doctors of the World group said.

It said its members had witnessed a situation of chaos and confusion in Baghdad because of the lack of law and order. The Iraqi capital consisted of bombed buildings and garbage-strewn streets, a situation worsened by the lack of essential services such as water supply, telecommunications and electricity.

Some of the aid was sent over on a Greek Air Force plane, but most of it was packed into 12 crates and sent to Lattakia in Syria. The volunteers accompanied the supplies to Baghdad via Damascus. The largest portion of supplies was immediately distributed to homes and hospitals in Baghdad and the remainder was placed in a warehouse and distributed throughout the rest of their visit.

The organisation said it plans to continue its campaign and will be sending medical supplies and groups of doctors to provide more medical assistance in future.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2003

Sunday, June 22, 2003

[03] CSE counters bad press for the Med 100

THE Cyprus Stock Exchange (CSE) has hit back at a press report on Friday criticising the handling of the new Financial Times FTSE Med 100 index, a joint index it has undertaken with its Athens and Tel Aviv counterparts.

One Greek-language Cypriot daily said it had been impossible to find the closing figures for the Med 100 on Thursday, the day it was officially launched in Nicosia, and that delays had been caused by technical hitches. The new index, which comprises the top listed companies from the three exchanges, including five from Cyprus, had also ended 0.44 per cent down. Its base starting level was 5,000 points.

But yesterday a statement from the CSE denied there had been any problems with the first official day’s trading on the Med 100. It said that FTSE had been running the index on a test basis since June 9 and that in fact its opening level on Thursday was 5,299 points.

The test margin is designed to allow for likely initial changes and adaptations in the indices pending its stabilisation in the first days of opening. The index closed 23 points lower at 5,276.

“These prices were channelled regularly to the suppliers of information all over the world,” the statement said.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2003

Sunday, June 22, 2003

[04] CY’s Hellas Jet launch delayed

CYPRUS Airways (CY) has had to delay the launch of its Hellas Jet venture on the Greek airline market, which was due to begin operation tomorrow.

The company declined to comment on the delay, but it is believed CY has not yet obtained all of the necessary licences from the Greek authorities. Sources close to the company said yesterday they would have a clearer idea of the situation early in the week.

CY officials were in Greece two weeks ago for talks on obtaining the necessary licences and had enlisted the help of the Cyprus government to push Greek officials to move faster.

Hellas Jet, which will be 49 per cent owned by CY and 51 per cent by two Greek banks, Alpha and Omega, plans to operate Greek domestic flights as well as provide links between Athens and five European destinations -- London Heathrow, Brussels, Paris, Amsterdam, and either Frankfurt or Munich. CY has already leased three Airbus A320s and hired 200 staff for the new airline.

Passengers from Cyprus would be able to use the new airline although the national carrier already serves the routes nominated except for Munich. The partners in the airline established Hellas Jet to capture a share of the expected increased traffic during the 2004 Summer Olympic Games in Greece.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2003

Sunday, June 22, 2003

[05] Harry’s here and local fans are happy

EXCITED Harry Potter readers in Cyprus yesterday joined other fans worldwide in getting their hands on the long-awaited Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix; the fifth book in the seven-book boy wizard series by JK Rowling.

At precisely 12.01am British Summer Time (BST) yesterday, millions of excited book readers around the globe were finally able to buy the latest, eagerly anticipated, Harry Potter book published by Bloomsbury.

Within two hours of bookshops opening around the island, all copies of the book were sold out, Hellenic Distribution Agency, the distributor of Bloomsbury Publishers in Cyprus, told the Sunday Mail.

Because of the secrecy surrounding the book, which had been strictly embargoed until yesterday’s post-midnight launch, publishers in Britain only sent it to print last week. This caused delays in shipments abroad and meant only a limited number of books could be reserved for bookshops abroad, particularly if they had not placed early orders for the first print run.

Only a few bookshops in Cyprus had copies of the hardback 766-page book, including the Moufflon Bookshops in Nicosia and Paphos, the Soloneion Book Centre in Nicosia, the Academic and General Bookshop in Larnaca, and the British Bases YWCA in Akrotiri.

But most of these had been pre-sold to anxious readers who had ordered them in advance, apart from Academic and General Bookshop which said yesterday it had “enough copies to reserve for our respected customers, as well as enough copies to stock our shelves”. It said this was because it had completed and processed its orders for the book in April and had agreed with the publishers not to display or sell the book before its worldwide launch.

Hellenic Distribution Agency said the first batch that it brought in sold out “in the first two hours of Saturday morning” - the first day of sales.

“Early next week a second consignment is being flown in to meet the unprecedented demand. Should the need arise we will be more than willing to bring in a third shipment,” a spokesman said.

He added: “We are aware that a lot of people want to buy the book and may find difficulty in doing so. They can call here and we will arrange for them to receive a copy.”

Moufflon bookshop in Nicosia said it had received many phone calls expressing interest in the book throughout Friday as well as yesterday morning. But none of its copies was on sale to casual callers because other customers had already ordered them in advance.

“We had 45 pre-orders. Paphos had around the same number,” said Ruth Keshishian at the Moufflon. “It will sell right through the summer. Some people prefer the American version because the cover design is different, and we haven’t had those in yet. I think most people will get their copies within a month, whichever version they prefer.”

Hellenic said it would be distributing more books in Nicosia, Larnaca and Paphos tomorrow or on Tuesday. These include the Hellenic bookshop at the Hilton hotel, the Metropolitan bookshop, Moufflon, Soloneion, Kohlias, Woolworths, Cessac in Dhekelia, Larnaca Airport and Academic and General.

Copyright Cyprus Mail 2003

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