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/High commission 'spies' named in MI6 list/ THERE was a variety of lead
stories yesterday, ranging from revelations about spies working for the
British High Commission in Nicosia to Spyros Kyprianou's adventure in
Teheran.
Politis
reported that the fuss caused in Britain by the revelation of the identity
of 116 MI6 agents had also affected Cyprus. Six British agents whose names
had appeared on the list - posted on an internet web page - had served at
the High Commission in Cyprus, primarily as press spokesmen, the paper
said. The British government has barred the publication of the list, which
the Foreign Office described as "a mix of fact and fiction". According to
the paper, Cyprus' security services had information about foreign agents
arriving in Cyprus as diplomats of mainly big countries. However, the paper
was unable to establish whether the six British diplomats were included on
the list of the Cypriot secret services.
Machi led
with a report of how a group of Iranians, believed to have links with the
Turkish secret service MIT, had left a box of explosives outside the Cyprus
embassy in Iran. The group had beaten up the embassy building's guard, but
fled when the police, who had been called by the ambassador's wife, arrived
at the scene. While this was happening, ambassador George Virides was at
the airport waiting for House President Spyros Kyprianou to arrive in
Teheran at the head of a parliamentary delegation. Confusion was caused by
a report in an Iranian paper suggesting that there had been a bomb attack
at the embassy while Kyprianou entered the building.
Alithia
reported that the government had decided radically to change the procedures
for buying arms. It will no longer buy weapons directly from manufacturers,
but from the manufacturers' agents in Cyprus. In this way, it hoped to keep
track of the commissions paid to the agents. Under the old system, the
manufacturer's local agent would still get commission on a deal but this
was paid under the table and therefore was not taxed. By going through the
agent, the percentage paid in commission would be known and therefore be
taxed.
Phileleftheros,
for the third successive day, led with another pessimistic report about the
new initiative being worked out for Cyprus. It said that the foreign
ministers of Greece and Cyprus, during last week's talks, agreed that this
was the worst possible time for an peace initiative. Well-informed sources
claimed that Turkey's active involvement in the Nato operations against
Yugoslavia was a very negative development, raising fears that the content
of an imminent initiative would not be favourable to the Greek side.
Simerini
reported the existence of a rift within Nato with regard to the use of
ground troops in Yugoslavia. It said that Greece, Italy and Germany had
"attempted to close the door of war and to open the window for democracy".
Greece had been trying to create the conditions that would allow the
settlement of the crisis by the UN Security Council, while the German
Chancellor, after talks with the Italian Prime Minister, said that the
deployment of ground troops was not under consideration.
Haravghi said that
communist party Akel had worked out its own proposals for the economy to
counter the government's "neo-liberal" taxation plans. The Akel proposals
envisaged modifications to the taxation system that would make it "socially
fairer".
© Copyright Cyprus Mail 1999
