Новости за 11.10.2015

By Karolina Tagaris The European Union must stop countries picking and choosing which refugees they accept in its relocation programme, otherwise it will turn into a shameful “human market”, Greece’s new migration minister said in an interview. The EU has approved a plan to share out 160,000 refugees, mostly Syrians and Eritreans, across its 28 […]

By Alan Baldwin Lewis Hamilton won a dramatic Russian Formula One Grand Prix on Sunday to take a huge step towards his third world championship after Mercedes team mate Nico Rosberg retired early on with throttle failure. The win was Hamilton’s ninth of the season, and the 42nd of his career, and the Briton’s untroubled […]

Several senior figures from Islamic State were killed in an air strike while meeting in a town in western Iraq, but the group’s leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi did not appear to be among them, residents of the town and hospital sources said. Iraq said on Sunday its air force had hit the meeting and had […]

Russia has asked the British defence attache in Moscow to clarify media reports that British pilots had been given permission to attack Russian jets if they are fired on whilst flying sorties over Iraq, Interfax news agency reported on Sunday. The British attache said he would submit an official response in the near future, RIA […]

Iran’s judiciary said on Sunday that a ruling had been issued in the espionage trial of Iranian-American journalist Jason Rezaian, but gave no further details about the case, which has complicated moves to ease hostility between Washington and Tehran. California-born Rezaian, the Washington Post’s Tehran bureau chief, was arrested in July 2014. The final hearing […]

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Sunday ruled out tax increases to help deal with the biggest influx of refugees since World War Two. “We can be glad that our economy has been well managed for years and that our economic situation is currently good,” Merkel said in an advance preview of an interview to be […]

Thousands of Lebanese rallied at the presidential palace outside Beirut on Sunday in a show of support for Christian politician Michel Aoun, pressing their demand for him to fill the presidency vacant for over a year. Waving the orange flag of Aoun’s Free Patriotic Movement (FPM), they packed streets in the Baabda district that houses […]

The Iraqi air force struck a convoy of Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in western Anbar province close to the Syrian border on Sunday, a military statement said. The fate of the militant leader, who has declared himself the leader of a caliphate in areas his ultrahardline Sunni group controls in Iraq and Syria, […]

During checks on Saturday night and early Sunday, police booked 169 people for speeding and 28 for drink driving islandwide, they said. One of those booked for speeding was driving at 150kph in a 100kph zone in Larnaca. Though officers signalled the driver, a 23-year-old from Larnaca, to stop, he failed to do so but […]

Police are studying utilising canine units to combat football hooliganism, Justice Minister Ionas Nicolaou said on Sunday on the sidelines of the open day held by the force to interact more with the public. Nicolaou said instructions had already been given for the matter to be studied, based on which police will be able to […]

By Daren Butler Turkish warplanes struck Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant targets in northern Iraq and southeastern Turkey on Saturday and Sunday, pressing their military campaign a day after the rebel group ordered its fighters to halt attacks on Turkish soil. Security sources said some 30-35 PKK guerrillas were killed in northern Iraqi raids on […]

Police on Sunday held an open day for the public at a site close to headquarters in Nicosia. The event, running until 6pm, included various demonstrations related to police work such as a mock helicopter rescue, a mock bomb defusal and a show of how the police canine unit works. A music programme and bouncy […]

The Greek Cypriot side will accept neither majorities of people and property, nor permanent derogations from the EU acquis under a solution, President Nicos Anastasiades said on Sunday. Anastasiades was addressing the annual anti-occupation event for Morphou refugees, which was held in Astromeritis. His comment is seen as response to Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci […]

The Syrian army backed by allied militia has advanced in western Syria after heavy Russian air strikes in areas around the main highway running through major cities, a group monitoring the war said on Sunday. After deadly clashes, the military and Lebanese Hezbollah militiamen took control of Tal Skik, a highland area in Idlib province […]

An explosion ripped through a restaurant in eastern China on Saturday, killing at least 17 people, the official Xinhua news agency reported, blaming the accident on a gas cylinder. The blast caused a fire at the restaurant in Wuhu city in Anhui province, the report said, citing local authorities. It gave no other details. In […]

The Cyprus foreign ministry on Sunday strongly condemned the deadly terrorist attack on Saturday in the centre of Turkey’s capital, Ankara that killed at least 95 people. “We express our sincere condolences to the Government of Turkey and the families of the innocent victims,” a statement from the foreign ministry said. “The Republic of Cyprus […]

By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Jeffrey Heller An Israeli air strike killed a Palestinian mother and daughter in the Gaza Strip on Sunday and police, confronting a surge of stabbing attacks in Israel, said they foiled an attempt to drive a car bomb into Jerusalem. Four Israelis and 23 Palestinians have died in 12 days of […]

By Umit Bektas Thousands of people, many chanting anti-government slogans, gathered in central Ankara on Sunday near the scene of bomb blasts which killed at least 95 people, mourning the victims of the most deadly attack of its kind on Turkish soil. Two suspected suicide bombers hit a rally of pro-Kurdish and labour activists near […]

Two men were injured in a stabbing attack in the early hours of Sunday on a street in Limassol, police said. According to police they received a call at around 5.15am that two men had been attacked by five others, unknown to them, one of whom had used a knife on them. At the scene, […]

By Hamid Shalizi A suicide bomber attacked a convoy of foreign troops during the Sunday morning rush hour in the Afghan capital, flipping an armoured vehicle on its side and wounding at least three civilians. Taliban insurgents fighting to topple the foreign-backed Kabul government claimed responsibility for the attack, which followed a series of bombings […]

A Palestinian woman motorist set off a bomb after being pulled over by Israeli police near a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank on Sunday, wounding herself and an officer, police said. The incident followed a surge since last week in Palestinian attacks on Israelis, mostly with crude weapons like knives and rocks, and […]

Thirteen refugees, including six children, were rescued near Liopetri on Saturday night, the Cyprus News Agency reported on Sunday. It said that according to police at around 7pm they received information that a boat with refugees was close to Cyprus. Port Police went to the area where the boat was spotted and it was towed […]

By Annette Chrysostomou This week, England, the last hold-out in the UK, introduced a 5p charge on plastic bags for shoppers, at least in big supermarkets, but while English people used only 140 bags per person last year, in Cyprus the figure is more than double that. Debate on the issue is still at the […]

FROM THE FIRST day he was appointed Auditor-General, Odysseas Michaelides looked like a man on a mission to right all the wrongs in the state machinery. He was in a big hurry to investigate and expose everything that was suspect in the public sector and become the scourge of civil servants who did not obey […]

THE LAVISH praise and gushing write-ups have quite clearly gone to auditor-general Odysseas Michaelides’ head. The signs of megalomania he has been exhibiting recently are frightening, and what had initially seemed an inspired appointment by Prez Nik is increasingly looking like another error of judgment. The guy is acting like Kyproulla’s supreme ruler, intimidating civil […]