Friday, September 18, 2026
66b84ac2-e0b5-4855-89c3-e0df662ebb80
| Summary | ⛅️ Light rain in the morning. |
|---|---|
| Temperature Range | 22°C to 28°C (71°F to 82°F) |
| Feels Like | Low: 74°F | High: 87°F |
| Humidity | 70% |
| Wind | 15 km/h (10 mph), Direction: 287° |
| Precipitation | Probability: 88%, Type: rain |
| Sunrise / Sunset | 🌅 06:33 AM / 🌇 06:50 PM |
| Moon Phase | Waxing Crescent (24%) |
| Cloud Cover | 52% |
| Pressure | 1009.52 hPa |
| Dew Point | 66.22°F |
| Visibility | 5.85 miles |
The Central Bank of Cyprus (CBC) has confirmed that all banks in Cyprus will be closed on Thursday, October 1, 2026, for Cyprus’ independence day.
The closure means customers will not be able to carry out routine in-branch banking services on the day, although digital and online banking services are expected to remain available.
Businesses should also take the closure into account when planning payments, cash deposits and other transactions that require access to physical bank branches.
Banks will resume normal operations after the holiday.
The Cyprus property market remains strong but faces structural weaknesses and rising costs that could affect its future development, according to speakers at this year’s Cyprus Property Show, where the government also outlined plans to revise key planning frameworks.
The conference, held under the title “The present and future of property in Cyprus”, brought together government officials and representatives of the property, construction, engineering and investment sectors to discuss the market’s performance and challenges.
The event heard that 21,387 property transfers were recorded across Cyprus in 2025, broadly unchanged from 2024, while the total value of transactions increased by about 10 per cent to €4.73 billion.
Interior Minister Konstantinos Ioannou said the property sector extended well beyond construction and sales, linking it directly with the economy, investment, urban and rural development and quality of life.
“The Cyprus property market remains strong,” Ioannou said in a speech read by Interior Ministry director-general Elikkos Elia.
Ioannou said the government regarded housing as a major priority and was pursuing a comprehensive strategy aimed both at increasing the housing stock and strengthening citizens’ purchasing power.
“The future of the property market is directly linked to housing policy,” he said.
“We must view the housing issue in conjunction with development policy and urban planning,” Ioannou added.
He said the government was therefore proceeding with the revision of local plans for the major urban areas and the Policy Statement, with the aim of creating a more modern, functional and flexible development framework that would address current needs and future challenges.
Speaking on behalf of the director of the Department of Town Planning and Housing, first town planning officer Heraklis Achniotis said Cyprus was at an important point in the development of its planning framework.
“We have before us a unique opportunity, the preparation and revision of the Policy Statement, the Local Plans for the four major urban centres and the plan for the island,” Achniotis said.
He said the revisions should not be treated as a formal obligation, but as strategic tools for addressing shortcomings inherited from the past.
“What are the prospects and, above all, what are the new challenges that will determine whether our choices will be sustainable for the next 20 to 30 years?” Achniotis asked.
“Urban resilience is of decisive importance for the future,” he said, adding that Cyprus’s cities needed to be capable of withstanding shocks.
The housing issue was also a major focus of the conference, with Cyprus Land Development Corporation (KOAG) director-general Eleni Symeonidou outlining the organisation’s role and the projects it is promoting to address housing needs.
The president of the Scientific and Technical Chamber (Etek), Konstantinos Konstantis, also focused on housing policy and said the chamber had submitted a comprehensive memorandum on the issue in 2023.
Some of Etek’s proposals had since been adopted, Konstantis said, but he added that Cyprus remained short of its wider housing objectives.
He called for a unified strategy and a common objective centred on a property sector capable of continuing to develop while also producing better cities and a better quality of life.
Particular attention was drawn to the condition of older and dangerous buildings, with Konstantis warning that the number of buildings considered dangerous could increase dramatically without intervention.
“If measures are not taken, the 5,000 dangerous buildings that exist today will become 15,000 or more within five years,” Konstantis said.
He called for regular building inspections through the introduction of an MOT-style inspection system for buildings, arguing that such checks were urgently needed.
The Cyprus Association of Large Investment Projects also called for a broader strategy to support major investments and improve the conditions for development.
The association’s president Andreas Demetriades outlined the organisation’s position in a speech read by board member Christos Christou.
“We need a comprehensive strategy for the next day,” the association said, calling for a substantial acceleration in the licensing of strategic investments.
It also called for a stable and predictable planning, tax and investment framework, modern infrastructure and competitive energy costs.
The association said Cyprus also needed access to the specialised workforce required by the economy, while the green transition and technology should be incorporated into the design of new projects.
It further called for a more active international policy aimed at attracting serious, long-term investors.
The Cyprus Real Estate Agents Association (Skek) said the property market had operated in an increasingly complex and rapidly changing environment in recent years.
Skek vice-president Vasilis Artemiou said geopolitical turbulence in the wider region, international uncertainty, higher construction costs and changes in economic conditions had created significant challenges for the sector.
“The geopolitical turbulence in the wider region, international uncertainty, increased construction costs and changes in the economic environment have created and continue to create significant challenges,” Artemiou said.
He also highlighted the role of professional estate agents, arguing that their work extended beyond simply bringing buyers and sellers together.
“The professional estate agent is something more than an intermediary between a buyer and a seller,” Artemiou said.
“The professional is called upon to guide citizens through one of the most important financial decisions of their lives,” he added.
The Cyprus Association of Building Contractors (Oseok) identified several factors affecting the introduction of new properties to the market, with its secretary-general Stefanos Pieridis pointing to labour shortages, rising construction costs, wider international and geopolitical uncertainty and energy costs.
Pieridis said the impact of these pressures extended beyond the construction industry itself.
“These increases do not affect only the construction industry,” Pieridis said.
He said higher costs were placing pressure across the entire development chain, affecting the viability of projects and adding further pressure to final property prices.
The Bank of Cyprus also addressed the housing market, with its director of retail banking Theodosis Theodosiou outlining the bank’s housing initiatives.
He said the bank had created an integrated ecosystem of mortgage solutions and digital tools designed to assist customers throughout the process of purchasing a home.
“With the new online mortgage service, the process is simpler and faster than ever,” Theodosiou said.
The conference therefore brought together a broad range of views on a property market that continues to record strong transaction activity, while facing pressures from housing affordability, construction costs, labour shortages, planning rules and geopolitical uncertainty.
By Sara Mariza Vryonidi
For one week in September, Limassol is being asked to do something that does not always come naturally to a fast-growing city: slow down, look around and question how we move.
European Mobility Week runs from 16 to 22 September, under this year’s theme ‘Mobility for Everyone’. In Limassol, we have given it a more local name: ‘Laou Laou’, the familiar Cypriot expression meaning slowly, gently, without rushing.
For Friends of the Earth Cyprus, the week is not really about telling people to stop driving. It is about acknowledging that, for many people today, the car is not so much a choice as the only realistic option.
Put someone unfamiliar with Limassol in the middle of the city and ask them to move around independently. Or think of a teenager who has grown up seeing the city mostly through the window of their parents’ car. What real choices do they have? Can they rely on public transport? Could they cycle safely? What if they are pushing a stroller, use a wheelchair, are elderly, or simply do not own a car?
These are questions about mobility, but they are also questions about quality of life, fair access and public space.
Throughout the week, different activities in Limassol approach these issues from different perspectives: cycling through the city, discussions on transport poverty and mobility justice, accessibility, public space, urban design, and stories from residents about how they experience movement through Limassol.
The programme culminates in a car-free day on Gladstonos Street on Sunday and closes on September 22 with In Motion, a short artistic documentary built around the everyday mobility experiences of Limassol residents.
On Friday September 18, from 6-8pm at the Amphitheatre of Molos, Friends of the Earth Cyprus will host the panel discussion “Creating an Inclusive City”.
The conversation brings together different ways of experiencing and thinking about the city: transport engineering, architecture and urban planning, civil society and, importantly, everyday lived experience.
Rather than speaking only about infrastructure, we want to ask a more basic question: who is the city designed for?
Then, on Sunday September 20, part of Gladstonos Street will close for cars for Car-Free Day – Laou Laou.
For a few hours, a space normally organised around moving and parked cars will become a place for walking, cycling, play, workshops, music, conversations, local businesses and simply spending time.
There will be activities for children and families, cycling and road-safety activities, creative workshops, a sustainable mobility exhibition, local businesses opening onto the street, public discussions and spaces where people can sit rather than simply pass through. Free bus options are also being provided for access to the event.
Even if you haven’t cycled in years, bring your bike, your skates or whatever wheels you enjoy. Bring a reusable bottle and refill it at the water stations along the street.
Come walk, ride, sit, stop, talk to people and experience Gladstonos in a completely different way for one day.
A future Limassol should allow someone to walk safely if they want to. To cycle. To take a bus. To move through the city with a disability. To push a stroller without treating every pavement as an obstacle course. To skate or use a scooter. And for children to have more opportunities to be outside, move independently and experience their neighbourhoods.
Most importantly, future generations should inherit a city in which owning a car is not the condition for participating fully in everyday life.
For us at Friends of the Earth Cyprus, that is what ‘Mobility for Everyone’ ultimately means. And for me, that is the kind of quality of life I want my city to offer.
Sara Mariza Vryonidi is a project manager at Friends of the Earth Cyprus.
This year’s event is co-organised by the Limassol Municipality, the Limassol Tourism Development and Promotion Company, Friends of the Earth Cyprus, and OPU.
Full European Mobility Week programme – Municipality of Limassol
Car-Free Day / Laou Laou Facebook event
Police on Thursday apprehended a 44-year-old man who earlier had hijacked a car at Paphos airport and crashed with at least one other vehicle.
The incident reportedly took place early in the afternoon. The suspect hails from a Larnaca village district.
According to reports, the man walked up to a parked vehicle at Paphos airport. Inside on the passenger seat was seated a woman, whose husband had temporarily exited the vehicle.
The suspect forced the woman out, sat behind the wheel and sped off.
A few hundred metres away, at the airport roundabout, the stolen car collided with an oncoming vehicle. Despite the crash, the suspect managed to drive on.
The driver of the other vehicle gave chase, alerting authorities by phone.
The chase ended shortly later, when the 44-year-old smashed into a metal barrier.
Police officers swooped in and took the man into custody.
The need to ensure safety at every stage of care and make it a constant priority across the health system was highlighted by the Cyprus patients’ federation (Osak) on World Patient Safety Day on Thursday.
“Recent developments highlight the need for effective licensing and supervision of places where health services are provided, for control of the conditions under which medical procedures are performed, and for ensuring that the treatments provided are based on scientific evidence and implemented in accordance with the prescribed safety and quality standards,” Osak said.
The federation welcomed the health ministry’s Cyprus-wide mapping of facilities providing health services and medical procedures, as well as plans by the Cyprus medical association to carry out relevant inspections and tackle practices that lack a scientific basis or endanger patient safety.
“These actions are important for mapping the current situation, identifying potential gaps and, where necessary, taking measures to ensure that health services are provided within a clear and safe framework,” it said.
Osak underlined that patients must be able to trust that treatments proposed to them are evidence-based and carried out by qualified professionals.
It urged patients to exercise particular caution when considering treatments promising significant health benefits without sufficient scientific evidence.
“It is important that they turn to appropriately trained health professionals, request full information about the treatment, its necessity, expected benefits and potential risks and, when in doubt about a service or treatment, seek guidance from the competent authorities or competent scientific bodies,” Osak said.
The federation, however, emphasised that responsibility for ensuring safety could not be transferred to patients.
“Patients cannot be expected to check operating licences, professional qualifications or the scientific validity of a treatment,” it said, adding that ensuring these requirements were met was the responsibility of the competent authorities.
Referring to recent developments, Osak called for preventive mechanisms to protect patients through the early identification of risks and immediate intervention when shortcomings or practices that could endanger patients’ health are identified.
“Patient safety must be ensured in practice, through a system that prevents risks, effectively controls and provides every citizen with quality and safe care,” Osak said.
The statement comes amid heightened scrutiny of plasmapheresis following reports that Greek singer Giorgos Mazonakis suffered cardiac arrest last week after allegedly undergoing the procedure at a private clinic in Athens.
The incident prompted public discussion over the legality and safety of the treatment.
The Athens Medical Association (ISA) subsequently investigated the matter and found that no plasmapheresis machine was listed in the clinic’s records and that the facility was not authorised to perform the procedure.
Meanwhile, health authorities in Cyprus have filed a complaint against a medical centre in Larnaca allegedly offering plasmapheresis.
Speaking to the Cyprus Mail, the health ministry on Tuesday confirmed that two previous complaints concerning the same centre had been filed in 2022 and 2023.
“Last week on Thursday we received some information regarding a centre in Larnaca following which relevant examinations were undertaken,” the ministry said.
Asked whether the centre had since suspended operations, the ministry said this did not fall within its remit and was instead a matter for police.
“The health ministry can only close a medical facility if it is licensed by the health ministry,” it said.
Cypriot authorities participated in a VAT fraud investigation led by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (Eppo) across a number of European countries, it became known on Thursday.
In Cyprus, investigations focused on five companies and one residence, located in Nicosia and Larnaca. Authorities tracked and seized various evidentiary items and electronic data.
In a statement, the Eppo said that it conducted searches, arrests and asset freezes in an investigation into suspected large-scale VAT fraud involving the online sale of mobile phones.
These took place in Austria, Bulgaria, Cyprus and Germany. Four suspects were arrested, including three in Bulgaria and one in Germany.
The investigative court issued asset freezing orders worth approximately €20.5 million against two suspects and two companies.
At issue is a suspected VAT margin fraud scheme involving new mobile phones sold to consumers in Germany. The VAT margin scheme is a special tax arrangement under which VAT is paid only on the seller’s profit margin rather than on the full sales price. It’s intended to prevent double taxation when second-hand goods are resold. Applying this scheme to new goods that do not qualify for it can result in significant losses to public revenues.
According to the investigation, the suspects set up a cross-border trading structure involving companies in Bulgaria, Cyprus and Germany in order to enable the unlawful application of the VAT margin scheme to new mobile phones sold online in Germany.
The evidence gathered indicates that mobile phones were passed through a chain of companies controlled by the suspects before being sold by German online retailers to end customers. By creating the appearance that the phones qualified for the VAT margin scheme, VAT was calculated only on the sellers’ profit margin instead of on the full value of the phones.
The investigation established that the two main suspects, a Bulgarian couple, organised and controlled the companies used in the fraud and applied the unlawful VAT rules across the entire supply chain.
It’s estimated that the fraudulent scheme caused VAT losses exceeding €15.7 million. The final amount of the damage remains subject to ongoing investigations.
Taking part in the investigations in Cyprus were the tax department, the police’s crime prevention department, the office for executing European investigation orders and letters of request, and the police’s cybercrime division.
Waste treatment in Cyprus is a ‘ticking time bomb’, MPs heard on Thursday as officials admitted that the system in place can barely cope.
Officials from the Environment Department described the Pentakomo treatment plant as a “ticking time bomb” when they took over from a private contractor.
The officials conceded that the situation “is still not optimal” but that it has improved.
Since December 2023, the government has entered into 180 contracts concerning equipment upkeep and repairs but also for the fire-protection system and environmental compliance.
For Pentakomo, authorities are now pushing ahead with a ‘transitional contract’ worth an estimated €62 million. This will involve management of the biogas, repairing the mechanical sorting system, upgrades to the biological leaching station, and installing a system that treats biodegradable waste to reduce odor, halt biological activity, and prevent harmful environmental impacts before final disposal or recovery.
Pentakomo covers the Limassol district since 2017.
Paphos continues to rely on a landfill where the waste is not previously treated.
The integrated waste treatment plant in Koshi – now operational for 16 years – covers Nicosia, Larnaca and Famagusta districts.
Its capacity comes to 190,000 tonnes annually. Old equipment is the major issue it faces.
For the Koshi facility, a separate transitional contract is in the pipeline, worth an estimated €100 million. The contract will concern repairs and partial upgrades. The tender will be published during the first quarter of 2027, with the contract anticipated to be awarded sometime in the third quarter.
Head of the Scientific and Technical Chamber (Etek) Dinos Nicolaides shook things up in parliament, saying that official statistics do not tell the real story about the state of waste treatment.
“Right now, we’re burying 90 per cent of our garbage – not 65 per cent as officials say. Considering the 100 per cent waste burials in Paphos, 80 to 85 per cent in Larnaca, and a similar percentage in Limassol, the average is about 90 per cent, if not more.”
Nicolaides also flagged the waste tips scattered across the island.
“You find them in forests, in ravines, everywhere. This is truly an ecological bomb waiting to go off, and we need to defuse it.”
For her part, the head of the Water Development Department said they undertook the responsibility to manage the facility at Pentakomo – a responsibility that was “way beyond our means”.
She added: “We did not achieve our environmental goals, but we prevented the sanitary time bomb exploding.”
Weighing in, Efi Xanthou of the Federation of Environmental Organisations accused authorities of embellishing the situation.
At the moment, she said, the waste at Pentakomo is “overflowing” and trucks are used to haul the waste to landfills.
“There are responsibilities for what’s happening right now, the sanitary time bomb remains.”
Cyprus, she added, is ready neither for the ‘pay-as-you-throw’ scheme nor can it meet recycling targets.
Director of the Environment Department Erikkos Elia said that under EU targets, Cyprus must bury less than 10 per cent of its waste by the year 2035.
He recalled that the European Commission has referred Cyprus to the Court of Justice of the European Union for failing to comply with the Landfill Directive.
MPs on Thursday demanded that the state pay up front for travel and accommodation expenses incurred by families where a person receives medical treatment abroad.
The matter of overseas patient referrals was discussed at the House health committee.
Patients are referred abroad when the required treatment is not available at Cyprus state hospitals.
Under current practice, the family or escort of a patient sent abroad will file a reimbursement claim after the treatment is completed.
But because of delays in actual reimbursement, MPs propose that the amount – or a significant portion of it – be paid in advance, as many families simply cannot afford to pay out of pocket while staying overseas.
Lawmakers also discussed other aspects pertaining to overseas patient referrals – such as the Health Insurance Organisation’s (HIO) refusal in some cases to rubberstamp ongoing or repeat treatment.
The issue is that the HIO implemented different protocols since taking charge of overseas patient referrals from the health ministry in October 2025.
A patient who earlier had got the green light from the health ministry, but who now requires ongoing or repeat treatment abroad, therefore has to resubmit an application.
This has led to delays, and in some cases to denials of such applications, MPs said.
The HIO said it’s aware of the issue and doing its utmost to prevent inconvenience.
Another matter is that, whereas on paper a patient has the option of choosing the medical centre overseas, in practice this is not always the case.
MPs also heard that, since October last year, the HIO has denied 28 per cent of applications for overseas referrals.
Monica Kyriacou, a senior official with the HIO, said that during this timeframe 657 patients traveled abroad or are still receiving treatment overseas.
The organisation received 1,234 applications, approving 889.
Cases are categorised according to severity: life-threatening, urgent, and ‘normal’.
For life-threatening cases requiring dispatch overseas, the protocols require an immediate decision, with the patient sent abroad within 48 hours.
Patients classed as urgent incidents must be sent to a medical centre abroad within seven days. For ‘normal’ or non-urgent cases, it is within 30 days.
Kyriacou said the time elapsed from approval until actual dispatch is on average one day for life-threatening cases, four days for urgent cases, and 22 days for non-urgent.
For her part, Disy MP Savia Orfanidou also brought up the issue of the state having its own airborne means of transport for such airlifts.
“This is a matter of life and death,” she noted.
The discussion in parliament will continue at a later date, with the relevant government departments providing written answers to questions posed by MPs.
Cyprus intends to submit a bill to parliament in December setting a minimum age of 15 for access to social media, Deputy Research Minister Nicodemos Damianou confirmed on Thursday.
The bill would bar anyone under 15 from creating or maintaining accounts on social networking platforms, with responsibility for enforcing the limit resting on the platforms themselves rather than the state.
“Platforms should implement appropriate mechanisms that recognise the age of the individual, be able to prove that the individual is beyond the age limit specified, without storing other personal data,” Damianou said.
He affirmed that the legislation would set out the specific obligations platforms must meet.
The mechanism for checking a user’s age will not depend on the state building its own verification system, nor on the government directly negotiating with individual platforms.
Instead, the government plans to plug into an age verification tool the European Commission is developing centrally, known as the ‘age verification blueprint’, and embed it within the country’s existing Digital Citizen app.
Under this model, when someone tries to open an account on a platform such as Instagram or Facebook, the platform would query the verification system, which checks the user’s age against national population registry data and returns only a yes or no confirmation that the person meets the age threshold.
No name, date of birth or other personal data is to be shared with the platform itself, with teenagers aged 14 and above already integrated into the Digital Citizen system.
Damianou said platforms would be given a period of a few months to adapt once the law takes effect, and would also be required to retroactively verify the age of existing users who joined before such checks existed.
“This cannot be done overnight”, he conceded.
He said platforms failing to comply would face consequences under the EU’s digital services act.
His comments followed Wednesday’s announcement by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen of the ‘EU Kids Act’, a proposed framework that would bar children under 13 from social media entirely, allow 13- to 15-year-olds to hold supervised “mini accounts” with a one-hour daily limit, and apply special content provisions for those aged 15 to 18.
Damianou said Cyprus was waiting to see how much flexibility the final EU framework would leave member states to set their own national thresholds.
“We believe that it will be the best possible solution to technically implement the regulation. However, this will take time to do”, he stressed.
Damianou said the domestic bill is at “a fairly advanced stage”, with public consultation to run through the government’s ‘citizen’s voice’ platform alongside targeted consultation with organised groups before the December submission.
An impact assessment will also be carried out by the child’s rights commissioner Elena Perikleous.
He said attitudes among EU member states had “dramatically shifted”, with concerns over addictive algorithms and their effects on children having since prompted a near unanimous shift in position across the bloc.
“Almost as a whole, Europe is declaring its intention to move forward with relevant legislative regulation”, he said.
The government has cited data showing that 98 per cent of young people in Cyprus actively use social media, the highest rate recorded in the EU, as part of its rationale for the measures.
The fiscal cost of the planned overhaul of the pension system will tally at “considerably more” than €50 million a year, Labour Minister Marinos Mousiouttas said on Thursday, while insisting that January 1 of the new year remains the target for rolling out the reform.
Mousiouttas was speaking to media after the latest meeting of the labour advisory board – currently coming together twice a week to review the government’s proposed pension reform.
He said the annual cost of the reform was discussed, but refused to be drawn on specifics.
When a journalist recalled that an expert earlier estimated the cost at €50 million a year, the minister commented: “It will be considerably more.”
Mousiouttas stressed that the timetable remains unchanged – by September 30 the government bills on pension reform will be submitted to parliament.
“The goal is to be able to implement the reform as of January 1, 2027, so that people can feel the difference as of February 1,” he noted.
Meanwhile the labour advisory board is set to continue discussions up until October 10.
A day earlier, speaking at another event, Mousiouttas gave a rundown of what the reform consists of.
He said the changes would see approximately 123,000 retirees get an increase on their pension.
Over 50,000 people would see a rise of more than €100 a month, while over 8,000 would get an increase of €200 – over a five-year period.
“Depending on the case, the increases range from five to 55 per cent.”
Noting that the reform was drawn up with input from the UN’s International Labour Organisation, Mousiouttas summarised its three objectives: “To ensure adequate income for those who worked a lifetime, to restore justice among the generations, and to keep the Social Insurance Fund standing for decades to come.”
A key change relates to how the basic pension is calculated.
“It will no longer depend on complex calculations which few can grasp, but rather something that is simple and easy to understand – it will depend on the total time that a person is registered and insured.
“And here is the big change: counting toward this time are not just the contributions you made, but also the contributions subsidised by the state for periods of your life which, up until today, the system had read as gaps.”
At the same time, the statutory retirement age remains at 65.
But, added Mousiouttas, people will have the option to continue working until the age of 67.
In addition, he stressed, the contribution percentage to the Social Insurance Fund (SIF) will not go up.
Regarding the 12 per cent ‘penalty’ on those retiring early, the minister clarified that it would be reduced, but not scrapped entirely.
Abolishing the ‘penalty’ altogether would threaten the viability of the SIF. Instead, it would be cut from 12 per cent currently to around 7.5 per cent.
Moreover, under the reform each and every pensioner currently insured with the SIF is guaranteed a minimum increase of €30 a month; this concerns people on pensions up to €600.
“I know that the €30 might sound too little. But for a household where every euro counts when they visit the pharmacy, it’s not,” the minister argued.
“It comes to €390 extra a year. And this is the threshold, not the ceiling, since for pensions on the lower end the total boost will be far greater.”
The total increase in pensions will be paid out over the 2027 to 2031 period. However, during the first two years beneficiaries will receive up to 60 per cent of the increase.
Mousiouttas cited an indicative example: a person who worked all their life and today gets €504 in pension, would see an overall bump of about €250 across the five-year period.
As to the SIF, the minister reiterated that the state would cease the decades-long practice of borrowing from it.
“No more borrowing from the fund, the annual surpluses will from now on be deposited into an investment fund, and provisions have been made to gradually repay the current debt, taking into account the state of the economy.”
To date, the state’s debt to the SIF is around €12 billion.
This would be paid back over a 40-year period. Meantime, actuarial studies indicate the SIF will generate surpluses over the next four decades.
The minister linked the coming pension reform to the prior overhaul of the tax system, saying the two should not be seen in isolation.
He said the tax reform left people more disposable income.
“Two reforms, one logic: that growth only has meaning when a family sees the results on the table.”
The medical practice of plasmapheresis will be discussed by the House health committee in October following the recent public debate that had emerged in the past week.
Head of the health committee and Disy MP Savia Orphanidou on Thursday said that the matter had been registered ex officio, with the committee focusing on the relevant framework regulating the practice.
According to Orphanidou, the discussion will concern checks that must be carried out in health centres and hospitals that are licensed to perform plasmapheresis, as well as the licensing of health professionals who perform the specific procedures and the medical equipment used.
“On behalf of the entire health committee, we have registered the issue,” Orphanidou said.
The discussion is expected to begin in October and is aimed at contributing to the mapping of centres that carry out relevant procedures that was launched by the health ministry on Thursday.
Persistent technical problems and delays on the Paphos-Polis Chrysochous road were at the centre of a meeting of the House transport committee on Thursday.
Following the meeting, MPs said the transport ministry had failed to provide an expected completion date for the project or an estimate of its final cost.
Disy MP Nicoletta Constantinou said inspections had revealed discrepancies and the contractor had subsequently been asked to carry out remedial work.
She said, however, that the contractor disputed the inspection method stipulated in its contract with the Public Works Department.
“Unfortunately, we now have a new road surface with issues regarding evenness, sections that are closed off, delays and other problems that have arisen and are causing inconvenience to the public,” she said.
Constantinou said the specifications were clearly set out in the contract and the contractor was obliged to deliver a specific result. If the road surface failed to meet those specifications, she said, it would have to be removed and rectified.
“If the contractor disagrees, there are procedures set out in the contract,” she said.
She added that the timetable for completing the project could not take precedence over the safety and quality of a road used daily by thousands of residents who had been waiting years for the new route.
“Paphos has been waiting for years for the new Paphos-Polis road. We will not, in the meantime, accept an existing road that barely meets the requirements. Either the project is up to standard or it isn’t. If it isn’t, they must rectify it,” she said.
Akel MP Valentinos Fakontis said the project had been scheduled to take 12 months and was due to be completed in January 2026. Eight months later, he said, it was facing significant delays and quality issues.
According to Fakontis, technical problems had also emerged in relation to the feasibility study and project plans, with certain works not initially provided for.
He highlighted problems in the Tsada section, where he said there were major defects and irregularities in the road surface, as well as road safety issues.
“We call on the Public Works Department and the contractor to take the necessary measures and repair the road surface immediately, so that road safety can be restored,” he said.
Fakontis said the ministry had failed to provide a timeframe for the project’s completion or an estimate of its final cost.
He also accused the government of being unable to carry out “even small-scale projects”, describing the situation as a “cause for concern”.
“If the state apparatus cannot carry out these small projects, how will it carry out and implement the larger ones?” he said.
Diko MP Chrysanthos Savvides referred to what he described as an acknowledgement by the Public Works Department during the meeting of problems on the section of road between Mesoyia and Tsada.
“Lives are at risk. Today, at the transport committee – where we raised this as a matter of our own initiative – the public works department acknowledged the issue. This is exactly what I have been saying publicly. The road is unusable,” he said.
Savvides alleged that the contractor was refusing to carry out the necessary work and called on the Public Works Department to intervene.
“So that lives are not put at risk; because if a life is lost tomorrow, someone must take responsibility,” he said.
Savvides also questioned how subcontracts for similar projects were awarded, claiming that the process was unregulated.
“This is the harsh reality, and this is the tragic result,” he said.
A Norwegian and an Irishman charged over an alleged murder for hire plot will remain in custody until their trial, the Famagusta criminal court confirmed on Thursday.
The 33-year-old Norwegian and 35-year-old Irishman face charges of conspiracy to commit murder, conspiracy to commit a felony and participation in a criminal syndicate.
Six further suspects arrested in connection with the same case, one Norwegian and five Swedish nationals, have since been deported to their home countries.
The pair remaining in custody were arrested at the end of August in a joint operation with a Danish police team, after Europol passed on information concerning planned assassinations in Cyprus offered in exchange for payment. T
The investigation led to a police operation across Larnaca and Famagusta, where three suspects were arrested, with a further five detained in Paphos.
The investigation began after Danish authorities alerted police via Europol to a plot targeting twin brothers from Britain, identified by the Liverpool Echo as Jamie and Aaron Small, former MMA fighters who had been staying in the Famagusta area.
The brothers are believed to have fled the island, with Merseyside police now assisting Interpol in a search for them.
A joint investigation by the Irish Times, the Cyprus Investigative Reporting Network, Norway’s VG and Sweden’s SVT reported that Irish security sources believe the alleged plot was commissioned by individuals connected to the Irish Kinahan organised crime cartel.
According to that investigation, the plan first surfaced on August 10, when a user operating under the pseudonym ‘Sponge Jobb’ offered cryptocurrency payment on the encrypted platform Signal for a contract killing within the EU.
An undercover Danish officer posing as a hitman was given photographs of the twins and told that firearms had been sourced from Turkey, before being directed to collect payment in Ayia Napa.
The organiser also claimed local police would be bribed to stay away from the area where the killings were planned.
The undercover officer arrived in Cyprus on August 24 and was monitored by police special branch working with Europol.
Surveillance identified an Irish suspect, reportedly linked by family ties to the McCarthy Dundon gang in Limerick, after he was seen leaving money at a collection point.
He was later observed meeting two Norwegian men, both with previous convictions for weapons and drugs offences, at Ayia Napa marina, shortly before the photograph of the twins was sent to the undercover officer.
The two Norweigans and Irishman were arrested on August 27, with five Swedish nationals subsequently detained after Swedish authorities alerted police to a suspected perpetrator who had travelled to the island.
All eight suspects have either denied involvement or declined to answer questions, with the five Swedish nationals maintaining they had travelled to Cyprus ‘purely on holiday’.
The whereabouts of the Small brothers remain unknown, and the motive behind the alleged plot has not been disclosed.
The two suspects trial has been scheduled for November 18.
Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman said on Thursday that conditions for a new 5+1 meeting on the Cyprus problem have not yet been met.
Speaking after talks with President Nikos Christodoulides, which he commented on as being “better than the previous one,” Erhurman confirmed there was no trilateral meeting or 5+1 session planned on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
Erhurman said Guterres’s remarks on Wednesday that “there is still a lot of work to be done” and “we cannot repeat the mistakes of the past” were significant.
He echoed his own perennial position that any expanded meeting must be results oriented rather than symbolic.
“At present, the conditions for a new 5+1 meeting have not been met,” he said.
He insisted that tangible progress on a Cypriot level between the two leaders must come first.
On the substance of Thursday’s meeting, Erhurman said the two leaders discussed the memorandum of understanding, the core of the Cyprus problem, and that Christodoulides had indeed presented new ideas, to which he responded with “his own views”.
He said any memorandum must avoid steps that “undermine trust”.
He cited the cancellation of two music festivals, a Barcelona football academy event, the Republic’s foreign ministry response to Turkish Cypriot representative Mehmet Dana’s meeting with foreign ambassadors in the buffer zone and decisions taken by the European Parliament.
Erhurman said the Turkish Cypriot side has now agreed on six of seven points raised by Guterres during his visit to Cyprus in July.
These cover new crossing points, demining, joint mechanisms for natural disasters and irregular migration, sport, EU citizenship for children of mixed marriages, and the structure of a civil society mechanism.
The sole outstanding issue, for the Turkish Cypriot side remains ‘new crossing points’.
He remarked that certain Greek Cypriot bodies had described the citizenship issue as a “humanitarian issue,” calling this “a small step forward.”
He however maintained that his view remains unchanged and that it as a human rights matter.
He said no agreement yet exists on confidence building measures or methodology, “not even on the first point of the four that we had raised.”
But he insisted the search for solutions would continue.
“For us, ‘no solution is a solution’ is not an approach,” he said.
Asked why the two leaders continue meeting despite the lack of outcomes, Erhurman said simply, “we meet to achieve a result.”
He described the leader’s sessions as ‘conversations’ rather than a negotiating table.
He concluded that he expected the New York meetings, which he will travel to next Wednesday, to produce “a roadmap for the process that will proceed.”
The health ministry on Thursday began mapping medical centres performing high-risk treatments, as instructed by Health Minister Neophytos Charalambides earlier this week.
The ministry said the scope of the mapping exercise and those responsible for carrying it out would be determined during internal meetings, with the process expected to produce results quickly.
Under existing legislation, responsibility for overseeing private hospitals lies with the health ministry’s superintendent of private hospitals.
The Pancyprian Medical Association (CyMA), meanwhile, issues licences to practise medicine in Cyprus on the basis of documentation issued by the health ministry’s medical council, after the qualifications and certificates submitted by doctors seeking to practise in Cyprus have been examined.
CyMA also announced that it would mobilise its members by sending out alerts encouraging them to help identify unlicensed practitioners and improper medical practices.
Under existing legislation, CyMA refers cases requiring investigation to the relevant state authorities and, where necessary, police.
The association said it was awaiting information from the health ministry and would initiate the relevant procedures if the mapping exercise identified issues falling within its remit.
CyMA said that following its recent administrative restructuring, it was seeking to implement decisions taken by its council in a “more organised manner”, including measures to address individual cases that could tarnish the reputation of the medical profession in Cyprus.
In this context, the association referred to a joint campaign carried out with the health ministry in 2025 to raise awareness of the risks associated with cosmetic medical procedures performed by unqualified individuals.
CyMA also called on members of the public to report suspected cases so that complaints could be investigated and substantiated.
Two Nicosia municipalities called on Thursday for the immediate revocation of the government’s decision to locate the new central prisons in Ayios Sozomenos, arguing the site was chosen without adequate consultation.
The joint statement from Dali and Latsia-Yeri municipalities, though acknowledging the need for “modern infrastructure”, called for a project of this scale to be sited only after “a comprehensive and scientifically documented study”.
The municipalities, whose boundaries lay adjacent to the abandoned village, asserted that Ayios Sozomenos already hosts a plethora of industrial and agricultural activity, including livestock waste treatment facilities, quarries, pig farms, alongside an EAC overhead power line running through the area.
They further reminded the government that the site falls within land earmarked for livestock farming under a national plan to rebuild the sector, a factor they said “cannot be ignored” in assessing its suitability.
Representing a combined population of around 60,000 residents, the two municipalities said local authorities could not be excluded from a decision “with such consequences for the wider region”.
They called for a halt to further action on the site until local authorities and affected communities are “properly consulted” and urged the state to examine alternative locations.
The call follows the justice ministry’s announcement on Tuesday that it had dropped plans for Mathiatis in favour of Ayios Sozomenos, a move it said was based on “cost and time criteria.”
The ministry said Mathiatis would have needed substantial new infrastructure, including roads, sewage, water and electricity networks, while Ayios Sozomenos has access to these nearby, cutting both cost and construction time.
Justice Minister Costas Fitiris had announced the Mathiatis site in March, citing its proximity to the capital and its status as state land.
Construction was expected to begin next year, with completion within five years on a €300 million facility designed to house 1,500 inmates.
That proposal drew opposition from the Mathiatis heritage protection group, which argued the area was environmentally sensitive and culturally significant.
Mathiatis community leader Theodoros Tsatsou had initially criticised the plan, saying residents had not been properly briefed, and pointed to existing pressures on the village from two army camps and land under Turkish Cypriot deeds.
Ayios Sozomenos, a village abandoned following intercommunal violence, lies near the Green Line and contains a Byzantine cave chapel, the unfinished Latin church of Saint Mamas, and mud brick ruins left by its former Turkish Cypriot residents.
A school bus route serving villages in the Larnaca district was suspended on Thursday after incidents of vandalism and disorder left seats broken and damaged, the transport ministry confirmed.
Public transport director, Andreas Nikiforou, informed that initial warnings issued to students failed to stop such behaviour, with the situation having worsened the following day.
The company operating the route informed the ministry that a ‘safety issue’ had arisen, prompting the decision to suspend the service until those responsible are identified and excluded from future travel.
“For safety reasons, it simply cannot operate,” Nikiforou stressed.
Nikiforou acknowledged that only “a small portion of students” were involved, and that the aim was to protect those using the service responsibly.
He said the incidents have been reported to police, with schools, the education ministry, transport authorities and parents’ associations also informed, though the culprits “have yet to be traced”.
Identification, he said, could come through “parents or the students themselves reporting incidents to school boards”.
In a statement, the transport ministry confirmed that checks on buses had been intensified for this school year, exceeding requirements set out in national legislation and existing contracts with providers.
It said safety depended not only on the technical condition of vehicles but also on conditions inside them, and that recent incidents of “vandalism and disruptive behaviour” posed risks to passengers and affected drivers’ concentration.
The ministry said damaged buses can be taken out of service for repair, and that limited availability of replacement vehicles and drivers sometimes makes temporary suspension unavoidable.
It urged parents to “reinforce expectations that students remain seated, respect drivers and fellow passengers”, and report any such incidents.
Education Minister Athena Michaelidou, speaking later in Limassol, countered the transport ministry’s decision, arguing that punishing all students for the actions of a few is not the solution.
“What is disturbing is that, for the sake of two or three cases, the name of all our children is being tarnished,” she remarked.
She drew attention to the fact that some 25,000 children use school buses daily.
She said she was in discussion with the transport ministry to find alternative solutions, including cameras to improve monitoring inside buses.
The Council of Ministers on Wednesday approved two financial support schemes worth €1.5 million for farmers facing higher production costs as a result of the crisis in the Middle East, particularly for fuel and fertilisers.
According to the agriculture ministry, the support will be provided under European Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/1894 and will be fully funded by the European Union.
The first scheme, with a budget of €800,000, will provide emergency aid to farmers and agricultural businesses to offset increased costs for “coloured” diesel.
Support will cover eligible diesel obtained between April 1 and October 31, 2026, and will not exceed €0.126 per litre.
Support under the scheme will range from €100 to €5,000 per beneficiary.
The second emergency aid scheme, with a total budget of €701,200, will cover increased fertiliser costs.
Aid will amount to 15 per cent of the eligible value, excluding VAT, of invoices for fertiliser purchases made between June 1 and October 31, 2026.
Payments will be made by the agricultural payments organisation (CAPO) to beneficiaries of the two schemes are farmers and agricultural enterprises that meet the eligibility criteria.
For the diesel scheme, beneficiaries must, among other requirements, hold a licence to use “coloured” diesel and have received eligible diesel during the specified period.
For the fertiliser scheme, beneficiaries must be registered under the relevant categories of the farmers and agricultural holdings register and submit the required paid invoices for fertiliser purchases.
Applications for both schemes are expected to be accepted from November 2 to 16, 2026, with further details to be published when the schemes are formally announced.
If the total amount claimed exceeds the available budget, aid to beneficiaries will be reduced proportionately.
The two schemes follow a package of measures announced in March 2026 aimed at addressing the effects of the energy crisis and higher production costs.
Areas of Nicosia and Larnaca were left without electricity on Thursday after cables were severed in separate incidents the electricity authority (EAC) confirmed.
Crews from the authority were dispatched to the affected areas and were working to repair the damage and restore supply as quickly as possible.
Acting EAC spokesperson Demetris Nathanael said two separate faults had struck Nicosia, both caused by contractors cutting underground cables while working in the area.
The first occurred in the centre of Nicosia, near parliament, with repairs expected imminently.
The second struck Tseri, which Nathanael estimated would take at least two hours to fix.
In Nicosia, the outage struck the Alfamega supermarket area of Engomi shortly after 1.30pm, with power expected to return by 6pm.
The area around the secondary school in Latsia lost power at 2.44pm, with restoration also estimated for 8pm.
The Ayios Omologites neighbourhood went dark at 2.16pm, with supply expected back by 8pm.
Strovolos was hit hardest, with outages reported in the Ayios Vasileios area from 3.12pm, restoration expected by 6.30pm, and in Chryseleousa and the area around the presidential palace, both cut off from around 2.16pm, with power due back by 8pm.
In Larnaca, Nathanael said a cypress tree had fallen onto EAC lines, cutting cables and interrupting supply.
He said a crew had located the site and was working there, with the damage expected to be repaired within one and a half hours.
The villages of Ayia Anna, Kalo Chorio, Mosfiloti and Psevdas all lost power within minutes of each other shortly before 2pm, with the authority estimating restoration by 6pm across all four areas.
Separate outages linked to planned works were also reported for the Larnaca district.
A scheduled cut is due to affect part of Aradippou from 8am on Friday until midday, while a further planned outage is scheduled for the Makenzie area from 8am on Saturday until 1pm.
In Paphos district, a single scheduled outage was listed for part of Poli Chrysochous, running from 8am to 3pm on Thursday.
The EAC is seeking to determine the cause of the fault, with repair crews on site working to resolve the issue.
One person has died and 14 cases of West Nile virus have been recorded in Cyprus so far this year, as Nicosia municipality continues daily mosquito-control operations across the capital.
According to the health ministry’s medical and public health services, nine of the 14 cases recorded up to September 17 have been confirmed and five are considered probable.
One patient with a serious medical history and underlying health conditions has died after contracting the virus.
The latest figures come as Nicosia municipality said mosquito-control operations were being carried out daily, including at weekends, in areas where breeding grounds have been identified or complaints have been received from residents.
The municipality said mosquito-control treatments were being carried out along the Klimos, Kateva and Kotsirka river channels, as well as in drainage grates, rainwater wells and other areas where stagnant water can collect.
Crews are also targeting storm drains and other areas where stagnant water can accumulate.
The municipality said its services regularly inspect known or suspected mosquito breeding grounds, including abandoned swimming pools, lift shafts at construction sites, open channels and other locations where stagnant water may collect.
Complaints from residents are also investigated, with inspections extending to neighbouring properties where necessary.
According to the municipality, mosquito breeding grounds are found in around 60 per cent of cases either at the property from which a complaint was made or at a neighbouring property.
Residents have been urged to regularly inspect their homes, gardens and outdoor areas and remove standing water.
The municipality said even small quantities of water collecting in buckets, plant saucers, pet bowls, gutters, unused swimming pools and other containers can provide breeding grounds for mosquitoes.
The Copilot impact dashboard now shows how many active users regularly use key Copilot features. Enterprise administrators can quickly see which experiences are widely adopted and which may need more enablement. Enterprise and organization report APIs now include the same 28-day feature engagement breakdown, along with an AI adoption phase reporting improvement that adds each phase’s full rolling 28-day population as of each report day.
copilot_feature_engagement: Adds the dashboard’s active-user total and feature engagement counts to enterprise and organization 28-day aggregate reports.totals_by_feature: Breaks engagement down by code completion, agent edit, passive Copilot code review, active Copilot code review, Copilot cloud agent, Copilot CLI, and Copilot app.users_in_phase_28d: Reports the full rolling 28-day population classified into each AI adoption phase as of that day. The existing total_engaged_users field continues to only report users in the phase who were active that day.Enterprise leaders can see which Copilot features are becoming part of developers’ regular workflows and focus training or configuration changes where adoption is lower.
Previously, AI adoption phase breakdowns only showed the number of users in each phase who were active on a given day. They now also include the full rolling 28-day phase population as of that day.
users_in_phase_28d and total_engaged_users are aggregate counts and do not identify individual users. users_in_phase_28d is omitted when the phase population was not measured. A value of 0 means the phase was measured and had no users.copilot_feature_engagement object can be absent or null when the calculation is unavailable.View Copilot Metrics permission. The Copilot usage metrics policy must be enabled.Visit the Copilot usage metrics API documentation to get started.
The post Copilot impact dashboard now shows feature engagement appeared first on The GitHub Blog.
GitHub Copilot expands existing CLI report coverage with agentic activity metrics for skills, custom agents, Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers, slash commands, and plugins.
The fields appear in enterprise and organization per-user and aggregate 1-day reports, per-user 28-day reports, and the day_totals entries in aggregate 28-day reports.
In a per-user report, the fields answer two questions about that user’s activity. In an aggregate report, they answer the same questions across the enterprise or organization:
totals_by_skill, totals_by_custom_agent, totals_by_mcp, totals_by_slash_cmd, and totals_by_plugin arrays list up to five items with the most recorded activity. Each entry includes an interaction_count. Depending on the category, this counts invocations for skills, slash commands, and plugin skills, plus custom agent starts and MCP server connection attempts.distinct_skill_use_count, distinct_custom_agent_use_count, distinct_mcp_use_count, distinct_slash_cmd_use_count, and distinct_plugin_use_count fields count the number of different items used. In a per-user report, each item that user used counts once. In an aggregate report, each item used by anyone in the enterprise or organization counts once, not once per user. These counts include items outside the top five, and comparing them over time shows whether the variety of items in use is growing.Enterprise and organization administrators are now able to identify which Copilot CLI customizations are gaining traction, find enablement gaps, and focus investment on automations that developers find valuable.
other. Copilot CLI telemetry already groups customer-defined slash commands under custom, so reports use that label for slash commands.interaction_count increases only when Copilot CLI attempts to connect or reconnect to the server. Successful and failed attempts both count. Calling tools from the same connected server multiple times does not increase the count.View Copilot Metrics permission. The Copilot usage metrics policy must be enabled.Visit the Copilot usage metrics API documentation to get started.
The post Agentic CLI customizations now in the usage metrics API appeared first on The GitHub Blog.
The Ubuntu 26.04 runner image for GitHub Actions is now out of public preview and fully supported for production workflows on both x64 and arm64. As part of this release, the ubuntu-latest label will migrate to Ubuntu 26.04, giving you the latest supported Ubuntu release by default.
To run your workflows on the new image, set runs-on: ubuntu-26.04 or runs-on: ubuntu-26.04-arm in your workflow file. Ubuntu 26.04 includes updated, and in some cases removed, tools and tool versions compared to earlier images. These changes can break workflows that depend on specific software versions or preinstalled packages. Review the full list of changes and test your workflows against Ubuntu 26 before the migration begins.
ubuntu-latest is migrating to Ubuntu 26.04The ubuntu-latest label will migrate from Ubuntu 24.04 to Ubuntu 26.04. This migration will roll out gradually between October 19 and November 19, 2026. During this window, workflows that use ubuntu-latest will automatically move to Ubuntu 26.04.
Because this moves your workflows to a new operating system version, the migration may break builds that rely on tools, packages, or versions that changed between Ubuntu 24.04 and 26.04. To prepare:
ubuntu-26.04 before the migration begins.ubuntu-24.04 to stay on the current image.To learn more about available images, see the GitHub-hosted runners documentation. To see the included software list or report issues with the image, head to the runner-images repository.
The post Ubuntu 26 generally available and latest migration appeared first on The GitHub Blog.
Workflow execution protections for GitHub Actions, previously in public preview, are now generally available for GitHub Enterprise, organizations, and repositories.
Execution protections let you define an allowlist that controls who can trigger an Actions workflow and what events can start it. Actor rules cover the who, event rules cover the what, and actions evaluate both before a run.
Alongside the actor and event rules you’ve used in public preview, general availability adds:
deploy.yml to a designated team while leaving CI workflows open to all contributors.Evaluate mode also carries over from the preview, so you can run rules in shadow mode and see which workflow runs would be blocked before you enforce them.
Vulnerabilities in pull_request_target workflows, such as Pwn Requests, are one of the most commonly exploited vulnerabilities in action workflows. pull_request_target runs with access to your secrets in the context of the base repository, so if code is executed from a fork, that untrusted code could poison your pipeline and exfiltrate secrets. We’re rolling out a default protection rule to limit the execution of pull_request_target events.
For public repositories that do not already have an applicable event policy, GitHub is introducing a default rule that disables pull_request_target. This default does not apply to private or internal repositories. It initially runs in evaluate mode, so you can see which workflow runs would be affected before enforcement begins.
On November 2, 2026, we’ll automatically enforce the default rule for affected repositories that were using the default pull_request_target policy before general availability.
To prepare for the roll out of this rule, you can view the results of the evaluate rule using Insights and see which workflow runs will fail once enforcement begins.
From there you have two options: leave the rule in place to block pull_request_target, or explicitly allow pull_request_target in an applicable Actions event policy if your workflows still depend on the trigger. Specific workflows can be allow-listed using the new workflow file targeting.
To get started, see About Actions policies, Control workflow execution, and the Actions policies REST API reference.
The post Workflow execution protections in GitHub Actions generally available appeared first on The GitHub Blog.
I've been building Routa, a lightweight developer traffic gateway written in Go.
It combines local tunneling, HTTP traffic inspection, request replay, routing, mocking and failure simulation into one tool.
It's still early, so I'd love some feedback from the Go community.
GitHub: github.com/7uyash/routa
If you find it useful or interesting, a ⭐ would really help!
First thing first, shout-out to the engineer who created wails.
For learning purposes, I went into the rabbit hole of trying to convert go binary to desktop app and now android mobile app. The wails3 documentation doesn't really cover everything with gcc, taskfile and some few files with Java/Kotlin code (I don't know Java). The desktop app works fine but the mobile app has issues that AI, me and not-so-existing docs have not managed for 2 days now. The app basically transfer files from one device to another in the same network. My mobile app can't detect itself let alone detect another device.
I need more insights, docs or anything to solve this.
Hey r/golang!
I've been working on Kori, a small Go toolkit built on top of Chi.
The idea came from wanting some of the developer experience I like in frameworks such as Hono, while keeping Go's HTTP ecosystem and Chi's approach to routing and middleware.
The goal isn't to build another full web framework, but to provide a few useful abstractions while staying close to "net/http".
Kori currently provides:
- Error-returning HTTP handlers
- Request binding for JSON, query, path, headers, forms and multipart
- Request validation
- Response helpers ("JSON", "Text", "RawJSON", "NoContent", "Redirect")
- Typed HTTP errors
- Automatic validation error responses
- Chi-compatible routing and middleware
One of the main principles behind the project is that Kori should complement Chi, not hide it. You can still use "http.Request", "http.ResponseWriter", Chi middleware, Chi routers and the rest of the Go ecosystem normally.
The project is still young, so I'd love to get some feedback from people who actually use Go for building HTTP APIs.
Does this kind of thin toolkit make sense to you, or do you prefer keeping things closer to plain "net/http" and Chi?
It took a while to marry together an architecture that supported server-side events while making sure the rest of the application was decoupled from them. I found that a lot of posts were myopic and say "Just use Redis" but there's way more to it than that. I wrote more about how the data gets into the Redis key, and then, yes, streams to the HTTP clients.
Tech used: * gRPC * Redis * Google Pub/Sub * Temporal
https://www.cadenya.com/handwritten/the-architecture-behind-our-sse-streams
Hello developers,
I would like to share all code I developed in the last 4 years. It is a trading platform made in Go and split into several microservices. What you can find here:
I believe there is a lot of working code that can be a good starting points for new projects. The code is also free to use if you don't want to create commercial products (Elastic V2 license) The code is located here: https://github.com/algotiqa
If you feel the work is good, please drop a star!
Disclosure: I contribute to Gonka. Posting for Go-specific feedback, not users.
Gonka is an open-source network where independently owned GPUs serve open-weight LLMs. The coordination layer (who is a host, which tasks get re-checked, who did the work) is a Cosmos SDK chain written in Go.
| Path | What it is |
|---|---|
inference-chain/ | The chain. Go 1.24, on a fork of Cosmos SDK v0.53 |
inference-chain/x/inference/keeper | Module state and message handling |
inference-chain/x/inference/epochgroup | Epoch groups, including the randomness used to pick work, and compute pricing |
decentralized-api/ | Separate Go service between the chain and GPU nodes (chain client, broker code, config) |
devshard/ | Devshard service (Go) |
testermint/ | Kotlin harness that spins up local networks for integration tests |
Code: github.com/gonka-ai/gonka · Docs: gonka.ai · Dev AMAs: YouTube · Discord #dev-chat: discord.gg/REcpeYc7P7
(actually at the top) TLDR: GoHT compiles Haml, Slim, and EGO templates into type-safe Go. And it got some usability improvements made to it recently.
The biggest change in this v0.9.0 release is an attempt to make reusable template composition feel more natural in Go.
The generated code now also creates methods to fill each named slot. I believe this will make composition easier to read or work with:
layout := layouts.MainLayout(). WithHeader(components.UnauthenticatedHeader()) // default the header to show a header with sign-in and sign-up if user != nil { layout = layout. WithHeader(components.AuthenticatedHeader(user)) } page := pages.HomePage().WithThatThing(components.ThatThingISentYou()) sidebar := components.AppSidebar(components.AppSidebarProps{ ... }) layout. WithSidebar(sidebar). WithContent(page). Render(ctx, w) There are a few supporting additions too:
GoHT is pre-1.0 software, so the slots change is intentionally a major breaking change rather than one with a great migration plan. So far, me, myself, and I have been the primary users. I've been fixing bugs or implementing things when I tried something I hadn't considered before and the program broke in some way.
There are also plugins for VSCode and JetBrains IDEs. Search for GoHT and you'll know you found the right one when you see the icon of a hoodied goat man staring back at you. I've been slacking on updating the VSCode extension because I rarely use VS Code and updating Textmate bundles are awful. The Jetbrains plugin is at least mostly up to date, but I'll be working on getting it updated for v0.9.0 in the coming days. The web site is at least updated with information about all the latest syntax changes.
Did AI play a part in this release? Yes it did. I used Junie to write my commit messages. I used Codex to polish my plan for the refactor, unknot my lexer code from time to time, and to write some code and tests. I also used Claude like it was a Google button.
Also, people always ask something like "Why should I use this and write my templates in yet another language?" Well, you'll use it because you want to, no one is ever going to force you to use it, me least of all. Also, is GoHT the best type-safe template option for Go? Maybe not. But it's the only one that'll let you go mad and write your templates in three different syntaxes at the same time.
I'm running into what I suspect is a goroutine leak in a CLI tool I'm building. Long-running commands seem to leave goroutines hanging around after the operation should be done, and memory creeps up over time.
I'm a bit unsure about the best way to actually confirm it's a leak or normal GC behavior.
How do you even make goroutine lifecycles obvious/testable, especially for commands that spawn workers?
Anyone dealt with this in their own CLI projects? Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Concurrency is less about “starting async work” and more about owning its lifecycle.
In .NET, I’m used to thinking in terms of Task, async/await, and CancellationToken.
With Go, simply writing:
go process()
is almost suspiciously easy.
The more important questions come after that:
Who owns this goroutine?
What makes it stop?
What happens if the caller returns?
Can it block forever on a channel?
How does cancellation reach it?
That changes how I think about concurrent code.
A goroutine isn’t just a lightweight equivalent of a Task. It’s a resource with a lifecycle that needs to be designed explicitly.
A useful rule I’m trying to internalize:
If I can’t explain how a goroutine terminates, I probably shouldn’t start it yet.
That feels like a much better foundation for reasoning about worker pools, background processing, pipelines, and eventually production services.