Monday, July 13, 2026
18e2f3b5-a2eb-4916-bebb-fc38e05e2c62
| Summary | ⛅️ Clear throughout the day. |
|---|---|
| Temperature Range | 22°C to 31°C (72°F to 88°F) |
| Feels Like | Low: 77°F | High: 99°F |
| Humidity | 69% |
| Wind | 12 km/h (7 mph), Direction: 247° |
| Precipitation | Probability: 0%, Type: No precipitation expected |
| Sunrise / Sunset | 🌅 05:44 AM / 🌇 08:02 PM |
| Moon Phase | Waning Crescent (96%) |
| Cloud Cover | 3% |
| Pressure | 1007.12 hPa |
| Dew Point | 70.36°F |
| Visibility | 5.86 miles |
Cyprus’ Scientific and Technical Chamber (Etek) has called for immediate measures to tackle severe labour shortages in the construction sector during a meeting with the labour minister, warning that the problem is delaying projects, increasing building costs and making affordable housing more difficult to deliver.
According to an announcement issued by Etek, the meeting with Labour Minister Marinos Mousiouttas also covered workplace health and safety, practical training for newly qualified engineers and the licensing process for tower cranes.
The chamber said acute shortages of workers, skilled tradespeople, foremen and site supervisors continue to affect the construction industry, with particular shortages among steel fixers and formwork carpenters.
It warned that these shortages are disrupting the smooth delivery of construction projects, increasing project costs and having wider consequences for the energy upgrading of buildings, affordable housing and the economy’s development prospects.
Etek urged the government to accelerate the implementation of measures currently under consideration to address the industry’s staffing needs.
Among the proposals discussed was the speeding up and digitalisation of the process for examining applications to employ workers from third countries, which the chamber said would help meet demand more efficiently.
The chamber also called for a comprehensive mapping of labour market needs and measures to improve the image of technical professions through the use of professional qualification standards.
On the issue of health and safety at construction sites, Etek reiterated that safety should be regarded as a fundamental element of quality and professionalism rather than simply a matter of formal compliance.
The chamber also presented its own training and awareness initiatives for professionals, while stressing the need for stronger cooperation with the Labour Ministry and the Department of Labour Inspection, with a particular emphasis on prevention.
What is more, the meeting also addressed the future of the practical training programme for newly qualified graduates in architecture, civil engineering and electrical engineering, which is financed by the European Social Fund.
Etek said the programme has made a significant contribution to the smooth integration of young engineers into the labour market and requested its timely renewal for the next programming period.
The chamber also raised the issue of the current requirement to obtain a building permit for tower cranes, describing the existing licensing procedure as dysfunctional.
Consequently, it proposed replacing the current system with a more rational licensing framework, developed in cooperation with the Interior Ministry and the Cyprus association of building contractors (Oseok).
Foreign Minister Constantinos Kombos will raise the issue of the agreement signed by Turkey and the Turkish Cypriot authorities which foresees the construction of a natural gas pipeline between Turkey and Cyprus at Monday’s meeting of European Union foreign ministers in Brussels, his ministry said on Sunday.
The ministry said that Kombos will “denounce Turkey for its new illegal actions”, having already declared the agreement “illegal” within hours of it being signed on Friday.
“The ‘memorandum’ in question, which was signed during the illegal visit of [Turkish Vice President Cevdet Yilmaz] to the occupied territories of the Republic of Cyprus, constitutes yet another manifestation of Turkey’s revisionist policy in the eastern Mediterranean,” it said at the time.
It added that the agreement is “part of ongoing efforts to consolidate faits accomplis of the occupation and the further integration of the occupied areas with Turkey”.
The planned pipeline, it said, will be built “both on the territory and in the maritime zones of the Republic of Cyprus, without the permission of the Republic of Cyprus”.
As such, it said, it “constitutes a violation of its sovereignty and sovereign rights”.
“Turkey, as the occupying power, bears full responsibility for the activities taking place in the occupied areas of the Republic of Cyprus,” it said.
Hours earlier, Yilmaz had said that “Turkey will continue to support the TRNC in achieving a strong infrastructure and a highly competitive and sustainable economic structure”.
“This step taken in the energy sector will be a historic turning point in cooperation between the two countries,” he said.
Meanwhile, Turkish Cypriot ‘prime minister’ Unal Ustel had said that “the project is not for today, but for future generations”, and that “it is a demonstration of our will to leave a stronger, more sustainable, and more competitive country for our children”.
On the political front, he said that the signing of Friday’s agreement “sent a strong message to the eastern Mediterranean”,
“The Turkish Cypriot people are present in this region, have deep roots, and are building their future with their sovereign will. With the strong support of their motherland, Turkey, they will continue on their path. We know that where Turkey is, there is security, and where Turkey is, there is strength,” he said.
Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar had explained the technical aspects of the pipeline, saying that t will stretch from the town of Anamur, which sits on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast in the Mersin province, to the Teknecik power station, located just outside Kyrenia.
Anamur is located between the cities of Mersin and Alanya, with work currently underway to connect those two cities with a natural gas pipeline. At present, Mersin is supplied by natural gas flowing from Azerbaijan via Georgia, and from Turkmenistan via Iran.
Bayraktar also said that the project would in fact consist of two parallel pipelines, each 22 inches (56 centimetres) in diameter, thus allowing the system to be “bidirectional”.
The pipelines will stretch a total of 101 kilometres, of which 97km will be under the Levantine Sea.
The European Council’s official programme for Monday’s meeting states that the foreign ministers of the bloc’s 27 member states and its foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas will discuss the ongoing Russian war in Ukraine, the situation in the Middle East, the Black Sea, and relations between the European Union and the United Nations.
Monday’s discussion on the Black Sea may provide Kombos with the opportunity to raise the matter of the natural gas pipeline agreement, given that the issue of energy features heavily in the EU’s Black Sea strategy policy document, and given that Turkey itself is extracting natural gas from the Sakarya gas field in the Black Sea.
Bayraktar had said in April on the matter of natural gas that “our focus is on increasing production in the Black Sea”, and had said in January that he aims to double production at the field, where 9.5 million cubic metres of natural gas were produced per day last year.
The police on Sunday said investigators believe that a fire which broke out in a car park in the Nicosia district village in Yeri may have been started intentionally.
According to the police, the fire broke out at 4.15pm on Saturday and “completely destroyed” two cars, while fire brigade spokesman Andreas Kettis said that a total of two acres of dry grassland was also burnt as a result.
He added that five fire engines – four from the fire brigade and one from the forestry department – were deployed to tackle the blaze.
The police’s investigation into the matter is ongoing.
A total of 24 kilograms’ worth of various cannabis-based products were found and intercepted by officers from the customs department and the police in a shipment of packages which arrived at Larnaca airport, the customs department said on Sunday.
The two packages had arrived from “another European Union member state”, with the department saying that they had “a suspicious sender and recipient”, and that the contents had been labelled as “souvenirs”.
A check of the packages’ contents turned up what the department described as “1,600 pieces of various types of products”, including “tea, coffee, chewing gum, jelly, cigarette filters, electronic cigarettes, and roll-up cigarettes”, containing “cannabis or other cannabinoid-like synthetic chemicals”.
In total, it said, the packages weighed 24kg.
A subsequent investigation into the matter led the police to a 31-year-old man, the alleged planned recipient of the packages, and a 23-year-old woman, who worked at the premises in Cyprus at which it is believed the products were to be sold.
Both were arrested, while a search of the premises turned up what the police described as “additional quantities of cannabinoid products”.
The police’s investigation into the matter is ongoing.
The police on Sunday said they are investigating a hit-and-run incident which occurred in Limassol on Saturday evening.
The incident reportedly took place at around 8.45pm, with a 25-year-old man being run over while attempting to cross a street in the city.
According to the police, the driver of the car “continued on his way without stopping”.
The 25-year-old was taken to the Limassol general hospital, where he was given first aid treatment and discharged. The police said he did not suffer any serious injuries.
A 41-year-old man has been arrested after attempting to rob a bank as well as stealing registration plates in Larnaca, the police announced on Sunday.
The man was arrested on Saturday, with the robberies reportedly having taken place in June. He was already in custody, after having been arrested in connection with a separate attempted robbery of a jewellery shop in Larnaca.
The police’s investigation into the matter is ongoing.
The north’s supreme court’s chief justice Bertan Ozerdag on Sunday renewed his call for a referendum to be held with a view to enacting sweeping reforms to the Turkish Cypriot judicial system, so as to allow it to operate faster and more efficiently.
“The constitutional amendment aims to increase the number of supreme court judges, to have administrative cases heard in district courts as first instance cases, to transition to a three-tiered judicial system, and to pave the way for compensation regulations in administrative cases,” he told the north’s Tak news agency.
Under the north’s legal system, such changes would require a referendum to be enacted, and Ozerdag said that a bill to this end had been sent to the Turkish Cypriot legislature by the ruling coalition, with the matter currently pending before the legislature’s legal affairs committee.
However, with the Turkish Cypriot legislature now on an elongated summer recess which will not end until October 1, it will at the very least be months before issue is discussed there.
“A constitutional amendment is very necessary for the development and acceleration of the judiciary. Compared to the past, this need has increased even more. This amendment is now crucial for the development of the judiciary, the acceleration of judicial processes, and the increase of capacity,” Ozerdag said.
The four-point plan for judicial reform was presented by Ozerdag and bar association chief Hasan Esendagli in December last year, with the pair saying at the time that a referendum should be held by March at the latest.
However, this did not come to past, and though ‘prime minister’ Unal Ustel suggested in February that the referendum should take place in May, this plan, too, evaporated.
Ustel is already planning to hold legislative and local elections in the north on the same day this year – December 6 – but both Ozerdag and Esendagli had in December warned against holding the referendum on the same day as another election, saying that they wish for it to be “independent of politics and solely focused on the judiciary”.
The first point of the four-point plan would see the north’s supreme court expanded from its current configuration of eight judges to 11, with “specialised structures” within that 11-member body to be formed for the court’s various functions.
Those functions will include the civil, criminal, and family chambers, the supreme administrative court, and the court’s duties regarding elections and referenda and constitutional matters.
The second point entirely concerns administrative justice – the matter of the fairness and legality or otherwise of decisions made by public bodies – with Ozerdag and Esendagli pointing out that a backlog of around 800 case files in the field of administrative justice has accumulated at the supreme administrative court.
To combat this, they suggested the creation of district administrative courts in the north’s six administrative districts – Famagusta, Kyrenia, Lefka, Morphou, northern Nicosia, and Trikomo – to deal with what they described as “simpler administrative procedures”.
The existing supreme administrative court would then act as the appellate body for those wishing to appeal district administrative court decisions.
Cases deemed “critical”, such as those related to the Immovable Property Commission or decisions taken by the north’s cabinet, would under the planned reforms still be taken directly to the supreme administrative court.
Additionally, the supreme administrative court would be empowered to order the payment of compensation, meaning those wishing to file for compensation would no longer be required to file a separate civil suit to do so.
The third point foresees the creation of a “three-tiered judiciary”, to replace the north’s current two-tier system.
At present, appeals against district court decisions are taken directly to the supreme court in one of its guises, with the plan set out to create intermediate courts of appeal which will operate separately from the supreme court, with those wishing to appeal those decisions then able to take the matter to the supreme court under certain circumstances.
The plans state that the supreme court would only involve itself in “cases of a principle and precedent nature”, and that this state of affairs would mirror reforms carried out to the Republic of Cyprus’ judicial system in 2021 following European Union recommendations.
The fourth point states simply that the new courts of appeal and district administrative courts would have their roles codified in the ‘TRNC’s’ constitution and that this will “clarify the judicial hierarchy”.
The plans foresee that should the reforms be passed into law, a transition period between a year and two years would be required for them to fully take effect.
The Turkish Cypriots have held five referendums thus far in their history, with the first taking place in 1975 to ratify the constitution of the interim ‘Turkish federated state of Cyprus’, which was formed the year prior in the island’s north in the aftermath of Turkey’s invasion of the island.
That referendum passed with over 99 per cent support, and a decade later in 1985, the constitution of the ‘TRNC’ was ratified with 70 per cent of the vote in a similar referendum.
The next referendum did not take place until almost three decades later, with the Turkish Cypriots accepting the Annan plan to reunify Cyprus in 2004 by an almost two-thirds majority. However, over three quarters of Greek Cypriots voted against it, and as such, it was never implemented and the island remains divided.
Two further referendums have taken place since, with the Turkish Cypriot electorate twice rejecting planned amendments to the ‘TRNC’s’ constitution.
The first, in 2014, saw then Turkish Cypriot leader Dervish Eroglu propose 21 sweeping amendments, including mandatory wealth declarations for ‘MPs’, limitations on immunity for ‘MPs’, and new regulations regarding the function of the north’s courts. Almost two thirds of the electorate rejected the plan.
Six years later, the Turkish Cypriot electorate was invited to ratify plans to expand the north’s supreme court to 16 judges. That referendum took place on the same day as the 2020 Turkish Cypriot leadership election’s first round and failed by just 283 votes.
Justice Minister Costas Firitis on Sunday said that he and the government are aiming for construction of the new central prison to begin by the end of the year.
“Our goal is to create a modern prison complex which will meet security requirements, offer humane living conditions to prisoners, and at the same time, offer a suitable working environment for prison staff,” he told newspaper Politis.
He added that given these aims, “this is a project which requires time – five years – serious planning, and consistency”, but stressed that “it is a project which the country needs and which we have already put on track for implementation”.
On the matter of the current central prison, he said that “the reality is that today’s prison was designed or a completely different era and for a much smaller number of prisoners than it is called upon to accommodate today”.
“The existing facilities were built 135 years ago and operate today under conditions and requirements completely different than those for which they were designed. That is why we considered it imperative to proceed with the design of a new prison,” he said.
However, he stressed, “this is not a project which can be completed overnight, but a strategic development which will serve the country’s needs for many decades”.
“The site for the construction of the new prison has already been identified and the processes for maturing the project have begun, while cooperation is underway with the Council of Europe Development Bank for its technical preparation and financing,” he said.
That site is located near the Nicosia district village of Mathiatis, with the government at present appearing determined to go ahead with construction in the village despite local objections.
Village mukhtar Theodoros Tsatsos, for example, said that he has not agreed to the plans, and that they can only go ahead with the village’s consent.
He argued that there is no space left in the village, which already hosts two army camps, archaeological sites, churches, and farms.
At present, prison cells in Cyprus are on average the most overcrowded in the entire European Union, according to data released by the EU’s statistics agency Eurostat in May.
Cyprus’ prison has an occupancy rate of 227.6 per cent – a figure which dwarfs the second-highest rate of 134.2 per cent, recorded in Slovenia, and France’s rate of 129.3, which sees it rank third.
A rate of over 100 per cent means that a prison is holding more inmates than it was designed to hold. Cyprus’ rate – more than 200 per cent – means that it is holding more than twice the number of inmates than that for which it has capacity.
Earlier, the Council of Europe’s committee for the prevention of torture had warned of “serious problems” at the existing central prison in Nicosia and said it had “grave concerns” over “the high levels of inter-prisoner violence” at the facility.
It spoke of a “failure of prison staff to ensure the safety of those in custody” and said that this has been brought about in part thanks to a “chronic shortage of frontline officers”.
This shortage, it said, “has allowed stronger prisoner groups to dominate and impose informal punishments, undermining safety and order”.
It added that living conditions for inmates at the prison “remain very poor” and are “affected by severe overcrowding” and said that “up to four prisoners” share cells of less than six square metres in area.
In those cells, it said, “two persons are forced to sleep on mattresses on the floor, when such cells are scarcely sufficient for one person”.
Additionally, it said that access to toilets in the prison is “inadequate” for inmates, and that more than half of the prisons’ blocks are “lacking in in-cell sanitary facilities”.
Donald Trump’s suggestion that he is prepared to reconsider Turkey’s return to the F-35 fighter jet programme has reignited debate across the Eastern Mediterranean, raising questions over Washington’s changing view of Ankara despite the sanctions that led to Turkey’s removal from the programme in 2019.
For Cyprus, however, the question is less whether Turkey eventually receives the aircraft than what the renewed discussion says about Ankara’s place within the Western security architecture.
“The F-35 debate certainly reflects Washington’s evolving judgement about Turkey’s strategic indispensability, even as deep disagreements persist,” Emmanuel Karagiannis, professor of international security at King’s College London’s Department of Defence Studies, told the Cyprus Mail.
“It is less about the aircraft and more about Turkey’s place in the Western security order after a decade of turbulence.”
“Washington’s framing of Ankara as strategically essential for Nato, regional stability and counter-Iran posture implies a realignment,” he said.
“It is driven by military leverage and geography rather than shared political norms, reinforcing a largely transactional partnership.”
Turkey’s strategic importance, from the Black Sea to the Middle East, underpins that assessment.
“Washington relies heavily on Turkey’s control of the Straits and its ability to influence crises from Syria to the Gulf,” Karagiannis said.
“Ankara’s geography and military weight make it indispensable for containing Russia, stabilising Ukraine’s maritime lifelines and managing Iran-related escalation.”
Yet, he says, strategic necessity has not erased the concerns that led to Turkey’s exclusion from the multinational fighter programme after purchasing the Russian-made S-400 air defence system.
“The S-400 system remains a hard barrier, legally, technically and politically,” he said. “The US Congress still views Turkey as a hedging actor whose ties with Moscow and divergence from Nato norms make F-35-level technology exposure too risky.”
A Lockheed Martin spokesman told the Cyprus Mail that the F-35 programme now includes 20 allied nations, more than 2,100 suppliers across more than a dozen countries and a fleet of over 1,340 aircraft adding that around 25 per cent of every F-35 is produced by European industry.
For Cyprus, the discussion centres on how Turkey’s return could alter the military balance in the Eastern Mediterranean.
“It would create mutual stealth vulnerability, complicate Aegean crisis management by compressing warning times and increasing escalation risks, and heighten Cypriot exposure by eroding the Greek technological buffer that currently stabilises the island’s security environment,” Karagiannis said.
“Broader regional deterrence, however, would remain anchored in the Nato framework, limiting the extent of structural change.”
He added that “qualitative military superiority cannot be treated as a permanent foundation of national security. It is a window of advantage, not a structural condition.”
While the White House has reopened the conversation, opposition on Capitol Hill remains strong.
Congressman Chris Pappas, who co-signed a letter urging congressional leaders to block any attempt to readmit Turkey to the programme, shared a statement with the Cyprus Mail.
“It’s outrageous for Trump to even consider readmitting Turkey to the F-35 programme while Erdogan’s government continues to violate US law and threaten our allies,” Pappas said.
“We cannot reward Erdogan’s aggressive and destabilising activity across the region.”
That congressional resistance is also central to the assessment of Dr Sinan Ciddi, senior fellow at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies and director of its Turkey programme.
Speaking to the Cyprus Mail, Ciddi said any move to readmit Turkey would face significant legal obstacles.
“There is very little way of working around those by presidential fiat,” he said, warning that otherwise “we’re likely to see a political fight break out between Trump and Congress.”
Ciddi believes those political realities explain why Trump stopped short of making any firm commitment during the Nato summit.
“Trump said he hadn’t made up his mind yet,” he said.
“That makes me think he understands there are significant legal hurdles and that he would have to pick a fight with a bipartisan Congress.”
He also points to timing, with US midterm elections approaching, Ciddi believes there is only a narrow political window even if Turkey were somehow to satisfy the legal requirements surrounding the S-400 system.
“I don’t think there is enough time until November,” he said, arguing that congressional approval would still be required.
One little-discussed aspect of the dispute concerns the six F-35s Turkey purchased before its removal from the programme, worth around $1.7 billion. The aircraft remain in storage in the United States, with Turkey continuing to pay storage and maintenance costs.
Ciddi believes Ankara’s immediate priority may simply be taking delivery of those aircraft rather than placing a new order.
“I think they’d be looking to take delivery of the initial batch of F-35s they were supposed to receive back in 2019,” he said.
Ciddi highlights that the longer-term concern is not simply the delivery of a handful of aircraft but the technological knowledge that accompanies participation in the programme.
“This opens the door… potentially to reverse engineer components of this aircraft,” he said, noting Turkey’s ambition to develop indigenous engines for its own defence industry.
“There is a worry that the stealth secrets and capabilities of the aircraft could be compromised, especially if Turkey hasn’t divested itself of the S-400.”
He added that regional allies including Israel, Greece, Cyprus and France remain concerned about Turkey regaining access to fifth-generation technology.
“A lot of European powers who are members of Nato are saying… giving them fourth-generation fighter aircraft is one thing, but fifth-generation stealth capabilities carry the potential of really upending the balance of power in the region and really empowering and enabling Erdogan’s expansionist and irredentist goals in the region.”
Ciddi believes another issue discussed around the Nato summit may ultimately prove more significant for the Eastern Mediterranean.
He said US willingness to authorise General Electric F110 engines for Turkey’s F-16 fleet appears considerably more realistic than any immediate breakthrough on the F-35.
“That actually is more likely to happen than the F-35,” he said.
According to Ciddi, the engines would initially power Turkey’s indigenous Kaan fighter while supporting Ankara’s long-term goal of developing its own engine technology.
“The goal here for Turkey is strategic autonomy,” he said.
For now, however, the future of Turkey’s participation in the F-35 programme seems to depend on Washington’s domestic politics.
As Ciddi stated, the United States has faced similar decisions before, recalling the sale of F-14 Tomcats to Iran in the 1970s, he warned that policymakers should carefully consider the long-term consequences of transferring advanced technology.
“We should be concerned with the United States trying to force through an F-35 authorisation and sale… to an increasingly adversarial Turkey,” he said. “That would be really regretted downstream.”
President Nikos Christodoulides on Sunday announced over €60 million in new spending on health infrastructure.
The funding, he said, will be spent on “the second and third phases” of the Athalassa psychiatric hospital, the creation of a new infectious diseases unit at the Nicosia general hospital, upgrades to both the intensive care unit and the pathology department at the Larnaca general hospital, and “significant upgrades and maintenance works” at the Troodos hospital.
He said that these projects will cost €61.7m, bringing the total amount spent on health infrastructure since his government took office to €206.7m.
Alongside the projects announced on Sunday, he also made reference to the planned new hospital in Polis Chrysochous, for which a decision regarding the expropriation of landwas issued by the government in March.
Timetables for the hospital’s construction were set out in January, with Christodoulides holding a meeting at the time with representatives of the Polis Chrysochous municipality and MPs from the Paphos district.
According to those plans, the hospital’s foundation stone will be laid in February next year, with construction to be complete by the end of 2028. Construction is set to cost €17m.
That €17m sits alongside the €128m of health infrastructure the government had announced in 2024, though delays at the time to upgrades at Athalassa had incensed trade unions.
Pasydy said at the time that the delay at Athalassa “undermines mental healthcare in our country”.
“A new psychiatric hospital is a key pillar for managing the growing needs in this sector, which has been dramatically burdened in recent years due to the pandemic, as well as economic pressure and social changes,” they said.
The union added that the completion of the second phase of construction is “vital for the hospital’s full operation and the assurance of quality mental health services”.
In addition, it said the project’s omission from the plans “raises questions regarding the strategic priorities and commitment to supporting mental health”.
“Investment in this sector is an investment in social cohesion, the wellbeing of ordinary people, and the reduction of social costs. Mental health should not be a marginal priority, but a central pillar of national policy,” it said.
The first phase of upgrades at Athalassa was finished in October 2023 at a total cost of just over €10m, with the government saying it “provides modern building facilities which will contribute to the rehabilitation and reintegration of people with mental health problems, respecting their dignity and rights”.
What, you may wonder, has become of ‘the little hacker’?
Joshua Polloso Epiphaniou is one of the handful of local criminals who are so notorious that they’re known by a nickname (for some reason, English-language media tend to refer to him as ‘the little hacker’ whereas in Greek he’s usually ‘the hacker’).
Calling him a criminal, however – though technically true – is a misrepresentation of his story, and the general perception of him.
The hacker, still only 27, has been at the forefront of four criminal cases in the past decade, with the most recent one being by far the most serious. Along the way, he’s racked up a number of firsts.
He’s the first Cypriot citizen ever to be extradited to the United States – where, in March 2021, he was convicted of cyber-extortion and sentenced to a year in federal prison.
He’s also the first-ever defendant in a local case to be charged with murder even though the alleged victim’s body was never found.
And he’s now also in the position – not a first, but still very uncommon – of representing himself in court in that same murder case, having fallen out with two lawyers over how the defence should be conducted.
He’s also autistic, having been diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome – and also part of what can only be called an underclass in Cyprus society. “Had he been born into a well-off, high-society Cypriot family, it would have been different,” his lawyer Eleni Erotokritou told the Cyprus Mail in 2020, as her client was being extradited after three years in custody.
His mother, Vivina Polloso, is a Filipina who became a naturalised citizen. His father is Cypriot, a police officer, and played no part in his son’s upbringing – indeed, he refused to even recognise Joshua, only doing so after a paternity test and a lengthy back-and-forth in family court.
Vivina is “a very polite, kind lady who’s worried about her son,” lawyer Michael Chambers – who also represented Epiphaniou around the time of the extradition – tells the Cyprus Mail now.
“And I think Joshua, the reason that he got into this mess in the first place, was because of their need for money…
“I mean, it was funny because when they arrested him they found €70,000 in cash, in his apartment. And he had a large amount in bitcoins. But he had bought nothing for himself. Nothing! He was in a tracksuit and a pair of sneakers.
“He didn’t go out. The apartment was – you know, nothing. There was nothing… He only did it to help his mother out.”
The little hacker was first arrested in 2017, still a teenager, and charged with being behind a cyber-attack on Cablenet in Cyprus that had brought their systems down for several days.
That, in turn, led to charges of having hacked websites in 2014-16 – including five American websites, hence the FBI’s involvement – and extorting money out of them by threatening to reveal stolen user data.
His lawyers fought the extradition order – but finally, worn down by nearly four years in custody, the hacker agreed to be tried in the US, trusting (correctly, as it turned out) that his youth, Asperger’s, and time already served would mitigate the sentence.
A year later, he was back in Cyprus – but by now he was running in some shady circles.
In 2022, Epiphaniou filed a complaint claiming he’d been abducted, and had money extorted from him, in the buffer zone by criminals posing as Turkish Cypriot cops. He also alleged, making the story even more complicated, that the same group had tried to persuade him “to infiltrate the network of Nicosia businessman Alexis ‘Alexoui’ Mavromichalis… so that one day he could get close and text Alexoui’s location,” according to a report in KNews that October. Alexoui, who had close links with organised crime, was shot dead in 2023.
This was the third criminal case where the little hacker was involved, albeit as the victim. A few months later came the fourth case – the disappearance, in April 2023, of 31-year-old Angelos Perikleous. Epiphaniou has been charged with premeditated murder, even though Perikleous remains missing and no body has ever been found.
The evidence against the hacker appears to include witness testimony that he and Perikleous had financial differences, some half-charred clothes that the alleged victim was wearing, evidence that the two were together on the day of the disappearance, and (above all) a statement by Epiphaniou’s uncle that his nephew admitted the crime to him while forcing him at gunpoint to help burn Perikleous’ car. Both the uncle and Vivina Polloso are being charged as accessories after the fact.
The police confirmed to the Cyprus Mail that their investigation is complete, that they’re no longer searching for the body, that this is the first case of its kind, and that it will be “interesting” to see what the court decides.
What’s also interesting are the proceedings now taking place, with the little hacker – representing himself – carrying out extremely detailed cross-examinations of prosecution witnesses, often consulting the copious notes he’s apparently made for every question.
The trial was only on the eighth witness (out of 96 that the prosecution plans to bring) when last reported, with the atmosphere often fraught and the judge intervening to rebuke Epiphaniou. “Repeated warnings, in a stern tone, came from the bench regarding his line of questioning, which was causing unnecessary time-wasting,” wrote Phileleftheros in February.
There’s a comical side to all this – but of course the case itself is far from comical. Chambers offers no opinion on the merits (he’s not involved), nor will he comment on whether the non-violent, computer-mad youngster he once knew could’ve turned into a cold-blooded killer – but he does point out a major systemic issue.
“This is a problem, I believe, with our criminal system… You arrest someone for a hacking case, then you put him in prison with criminals that have committed murder, and crimes of that nature. How do you think this is going to work out for that person, that young teenager? How do you think it’s going to go?
“It’s wrong of the justice system in Cyprus to place teenagers, or people who have committed less serious crimes, in the same environment as hardcore criminals.”
Chambers recalls the year when the little hacker was serving his sentence in US federal prison – and we hear a lot about the awfulness of American prisons, but in fact “when he was detained in the US, he was with like-minded individuals. Similar age, similar offences.
“I mean, he used to call me from the US. And sometimes he had someone else call, to say that Joshua isn’t available to speak now but, you know, he wants me to do this or that – and the person who called would be another detainee.
“And the way he spoke… You know, they’d call and say, ‘Good evening, Mr. Chambers. How are you today?’.” It was like getting a call from some posh boarding school, not a prison – but in fact “that’s the proper way to do it,” he insists.
The hacker (at the time, at least) was more of a wayward boy than a hardened criminal.
At 27, he’s lived almost all his adult life in prison – an especially stressful environment for someone who’s neurodivergent. He’s still there, of course, allowed some privileges when he needs to examine documents or use the internet to prepare his defence, but otherwise just another prisoner.
There have been some “incidents,” admits the prisons department, refusing to elaborate. In fact, the hacker (through his then-lawyer) reported having been attacked three times by other inmates – including being stabbed and having his nose broken – since his arrest, the third attack, in February 2025, prompting the authorities to move him to another cell.
It’s a sad story, irrespective of his guilt or innocence.
The little hacker never had a chance. He’s “a clever person,” reckons Chambers – and he obviously has skills that could’ve earned him an excellent salary in the IT sector, under different circumstances. (They still might, someday.) Instead he slipped into dishonesty and delinquency.
Vivina Polloso has been in Cyprus since 1989, she told the Cyprus Mail six years ago, right after Joshua’s extradition. Her son was born here. He is, to all intents and purposes, a Cypriot.
“But my son was always treated as ‘the Filipino’ – as a foreigner. Not a Cypriot.”
Government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis on Sunday denied that there is only a “remote chance” of an enlarged meeting on the Cyprus problem being convened during the summer, as efforts continue both on the island and abroad to bring one about.
“We do not have such information. If there is a will, and if there is the sincere intention to convene an informal multilateral meeting, there is time to arrange an informal multilateral meeting,” he said.
However, he stressed that the Greek Cypriot side’s aim is not simply for a meeting to be held.
“This informal multilateral meeting should and does aim to entail the announcement of the resumption of negotiations with a view to the definitive resolution of the Cyprus problem. Therefore, it is now up to the occupying Turkey to prove that it has the determination, that it has the sincere will and intention to function constructively,” he said.
On this front, he was asked whether President Nikos Christodoulides had been offered any information by the European Union regarding last week’s Nato leaders’ summit in Ankara, and said that “obviously, he had”.
Christodoulides, he said, held telephone conversations with both European Council President Antonio Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen after the pair had met Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the summit’s sidelines.
“They both contacted [Christodoulides] early in the morning. This had its own value, the fact that on their own initiative, and so soon, they chose to inform [him]. An exchange of views took place. What I think is now evident from all the statements made both by Turkey and the United Nations is Turkey’s interest in exploiting relations between Europe and Turkey,” he said.
Pursuant to this, he said that “what has become clear once again, and through the European institutions, is that the progress of relations between Europe and Turkey goes through the Cyprus issue, and that the Cyprus problem is not a national problem, but a European problem”.
“As such, it must be approached by Turkey itself, if it really wants to see progress in relations between Europe and Turkey,” he said.
On the matter of United Nations envoy Maria Angela Holguin’s current round of contacts, he made reference to her planned meeting with Antonio Costa on Monday, while also making reference to the planned gathering of around 25 leaders of the ‘Coalition of the willing’ states which have pledged support for Ukraine in Paris on the same day.
“It is known that this week, [Ursula von der Leyen], as well as several leaders, will be in Paris at the invitation of President [Emmanuel] Macron. If there is a change in the schedule of Holguin’s contacts, this will be announced by her,” he said.
The ‘Coalition of the willing’ is now made up of 37 countries, including all three of Cyprus’ guarantor powers, Greece, Turkey, and the United Kingdom, and Cyprus itself. Monday’s meeting in Paris will be the first upon both Moldova and North Macedonia’s joining of the coalition.
Leaders, including Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis and British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer, are expected to gather at Paris’ Hotel des Invalides on Monday, with many of the day’s participants also expected to attend Tuesday’s Bastille Day celebrations in France’s capital city.
On Sunday afternoon, Letymbiotis confirmed to the Cyprus Mail that Christodoulides will also be in attendance in Paris on Monday and on Tuesday. The Cyprus Mail has also contacted the Turkish government to enquire whether it, too, will send a representative to Paris.
Last week, von der Leyen and Costa had both called on Erdogan to “seize the renewed momentum” to bring about a solution to the Cyprus problem, with the UN having undertaken a “new initiative” in recent weeks and months with the aim of bringing about a resumption of negotiations in earnest to resolve the Cyprus problem.
This meeting came with the UN having undertaken a “new initiative” in recent weeks and months with the aim of bringing about a resumption of negotiations in earnest to resolve the Cyprus problem.
In line with this, Holguin is expected to return to the island after her meeting with Costa to hold more meetings with Christodoulides and Turkish Cypriot leader Tufan Erhurman, with a view to convening an enlarged meeting on the Cyprus problem, involving the island’s two sides, its three guarantor powers, Greece, Turkey, and the UK, and the UN.
In advance of that, the EU’s foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos, and Internal Affairs Commissioner Magnus Brunner all visited Turkey and signed a joint declaration with Hakan Fidan offering their support for UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ efforts in Cyprus.
Holguin, meanwhile, called on Cypriots to “seize this historic opportunity to negotiate a lasting solution” and saying that Guterres is “evaluating which could be the next phases that will convince both parties to take concrete steps towards a final solution”.
A Cypriot-flagged ship was “blatantly attacked” by Iranian forces while attempting to traverse the Strait of Hormuz, the United States’ defence department’s central command said on Sunday.
It explained that US central command forces had “began launching the third round of strikes this week against Iran” in the early hours of Sunday morning “after Islamic revolutionary guards forces blatantly attacked M/V GFS Galaxy, a Cyprus-flagged container ship transiting the Strait of Hormuz”.
“A civilian crew member is missing and the vessel is unable to continue the journey due to an onboard fire and significant engine room damage,” it added.
It said that Iran “was provided yet another opportunity to demonstrate adherence” to the agreement signed last month which many had hoped would bring to an end the conflict which broke out between the US and Iran in the spring, “but has again failed”, after having “been held accountable for earlier attacks on commercial vessels”.
“In response, the United States is imposing a heavy cost by continuing to degrade Iran’s ability to attack civilian mariners and commercial ships freely transiting the strait. The strikes are being carried out at the direction of the commander in chief,” it said, in reference to US President Donald Trump.
Later on Sunday, Cypriot government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis told the Cyprus News Agency that the shipping deputy ministry is investigating the matter, is “in communication with the ship’s management company”, and is “taking all appropriate actions”.
“At the same time, we are closely monitoring developments,” he said.
He added that the ship’s crew have been evacuated to “a neighbouring country”, the one missing crew member notwithstanding, and confirmed that none of the ship’s crew are Cypriot nationals. The Indian foreign ministry later confirmed that the missing crew member is an Indian national.
“Passing through the Strait of Hormuz is particularly difficult for all ships, regardless of flag, especially under the conditions of last night’s military operations,” Letymbiotis said.
Iran declared the Strait of Hormuz, a chokepoint between the most northerly point of Oman and Iran’s southern coast, which provides the only seaborne access between the Persian Gulf and the open ocean, closed on Sunday amid ongoing US strikes against its facilities.
The BBC quoted Iranian state media as having reported that the Iranian revolutionary guards had fired a naval cruise missile at a vessel which was “attempting to sail along an unapproved route”.
The ship, it said, was “hit by warning shots and stopped”.
Given the reignition of the conflict, last month’s deal appears to be in tatters, with US defence secretary Pete Hegseth having said that Iran “made a poor choice”, and that “now they pay”.
Meanwhile, Iran has launched strikes on other states in the region, with drone and missile attacks reported in Jordan, Oman, and Qatar, though the United Arab Emirates reported that it was not reached by Iranian fire overnight.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has expressed “deep concern” over advances made by Turkish and Turkish Cypriot personnel into the buffer zone near the village of Pyla, near Larnaca, in an advance copy of his latest report on the status of the UN’s peacekeeping force in Cyprus (Unficyp) seen by the Cyprus Mail on Sunday.
“The authorities in the north have claimed that a part of the plateau falls under their authority. Since early February, Turkish Cypriot police have imposed access restrictions on civilians, and on one occasion detained a Greek Cypriot individual, who was released shortly thereafter,” he said.
As such, he said that the situation in the buffer zone is “fragile”, particularly in the Pyla area, while also pointing out that in April, the Turkish Cypriot presence in the area near the village was “further reinforced through the gradual deployment of static vehicles’ present at key locations in the buffer zone”.
“Unficyp took immediate operational measures to deter further Turkish Cypriot police incursions into this part of the buffer zone by augmenting its presence and monitoring capability on the plateau, including increasing the number of patrols and maintaining a permanent deployment,” he said.
He added that “tensions peaked” in April when “Turkish forces amassed a convoy of 15 armed personnel vehicles on the northern ceasefire line, outside of the buffer zone, overmanned a nearby observation post with approximately 20 soldiers, and began deploying some uniformed deploying uniformed Turkish Cypriot police personnel”.
These personnel, he said, were deployed “in the part of the buffer zone that the authorities in the north claim is under control”.
He went on to say that “these developments occurred against a backdrop of continued hardening of the Turkish Cypriot position with respect to the United Nations’ mandated authority, particularly concerning the delineation of this section of the buffer zone”.
“The mission continues to engage with the Turkish Cypriot authorities with a view to de-escalating tensions and restoring the status quo ante,” he added.
He also made reference to the mutual understanding which was reached in 2023 regarding the construction of a road connecting the buffer zone village of Pyla to the nearby Turkish Cypriot village of Arsos, as well as residential properties and a solar farm, and which has been frozen since the November of that year.
On this front, he said that Unficyp is “reviewing options for a way forward”.
Nonetheless, he said the situation in the area “remains of deep concern”, stressing “the need for all parties to abide by the United Nations’ impartial delineation of the buffer zone”, which, he said, is “the only delineation recognised by the security council”.
“While Unficyp plays an essential role in de-escalating tensions and safeguarding the integrity of the buffer zone, its ability to curb unauthorised activity is limited without the full cooperation of the sides,” he said.
To this end, he said that he encourages both sides “to engage with Unficyp with an open mind as the mission redoubles its efforts to find a possible way forward on the arrangements for the Pya plateau”.
The Greek Cypriot side was also singled out for criticism regarding its own actions in the Pyla area, with the report writing that the University of Central Lancashire’s campus “continued to operate in the buffer zone without authorisation from Unficyp”.
This notwithstanding, the head of that university’s law school, Stephanie Laulhe-Shaelou was on Friday appointed as one of the 11 advocates-general to the European Court of Justice.
Guterres also wrote in his report that “criminality associated with the 11 illegal casinos and one illegal nightclub” in the village “persisted”, and that “to contribute to public safety, Unficyp maintained its community-oriented policing foot patrols throughout the village”.
Away from the matter of Pyla, he also made reference to budget cuts faced by the UN, saying that “contingency measures directed at reducing peacekeeping expenditure continued to be implemented”.
“To address the effects of a reduced workforce and [to] improve operational effectiveness, the mission adjusted patrolling patterns and increased its use of joint, intelligence-led patrols focused on recurring hotspots,” he said.
He stressed that “liquidity constraints have had a concrete impact on Unficyp, including a hiring freeze, temporary limitations on aviation use, deferment of acquisitions, reduced training, and constraints on official travel”.
“The mission’s ability to implement key infrastructure projects, such as perimeter fencing to enhance the security of UN personnel and premises, was also curtailed. These measures were implemented to protect core-mandate activities, notably ensuring safety, security, and stability in the buffer zone,” he said.
He also said that “no steps” have been taken to reduce actions taken in Varosha since 2020, and that instead, four “prefabricated concrete firing positions” have been added south of the abandoned Famagusta suburb by the Turkish forces.
Additionally, he said that Unficyp’s access to Varosha “has remained significantly constrained”, and that “the United Nations continues to hold the government of Turkey responsible for the situation in Varosha”.
Likewise, in the village of Strovilia, near Famagusta, he wrote, “the mission’s freedom of movement remains limited”.
On a more general note, he lamented that “both sides have embarked on a programme to install military-grade surveillance systems” along the buffer zone in recent years, but did note that the rate of such systems’ installation has slowed since the turn of the year.
He also lamented that “no action was taken by the Republic of Cyprus’ authorities to reverse the policy requiring civilian buildings along the southern ceasefire line to incorporate military positions”.
“Not only are such installations violations of the ceasefire line, they also dangerously blur the distinction between civilian and military facilities,” he warned.
Additionally, he said there has been no “tangible progress” in efforts to demine the island.
On the matter of the village of Avlona, between Nicosia and Morphou, where disagreements between Greek Cypriot farmers and Turkish forces over rights to use the land have increased in frequency in recent months, he said that Unficyp has “developed an internal action plan to address these challenges sustainably and comprehensively”.
He also warned of “unauthorised hunting, particularly … involving the use of firearms in the buffer zone”, which he said has “continued to occur with high frequency despite Unficyp’s repeated protests to the Republic of Cyprus”.
Sunday’s weather will be mostly clear across most of the island for most of the day, with temperatures set to reach a high of 40 degrees Celsius inland.
Those high temperatures may be tempered somewhat by increased cloud cover in parts, while temperatures on the southwest and west coasts will reach only 32 degrees Celsius, temperatures on the rest of the coats will reach 35 degrees Celsius, and temperatures in the mountains will reach 29 degrees Celsius.
Overnight, the skies will be largely clear, though increased cloud cover will be observed in coastal areas, and light fog and mist is expected to form in the east of the island in the early hours of Monday morning.
Temperatures will drop to 23 degrees Celsius inland and on the coasts and 19 degrees Celsius in the mountains.
The weather will be largely the same through Wednesday, with temperatures expected to remain where they currently are.
Hi all,
I'm the author of Kreuzberg (a document text extraction library with Go bindings over a Rust core). The next version of Kreuzberg will be released as Xberg - why? Well, we discovered that the name is not easy to pronounce or understand for people who don't have the German context, and this wasn't working well. Xberg is a common name for Kreuzberg in Berlin, and it has the advantage of being shorter and easier - so here we go.
Anyhow, this brings me to the point of the post. Since renaming a repo is a complex business, and we had to rename the repo to preserve the stars - but we now need to overwrite tags, it becomes pretty messy. As a result, we decided to go for an LTS version - published from a different repo: https://github.com/kreuzberg-dev/kreuzberg-lts. LTS in this context means that we will continue to do bug fixes and security updates until the end of this year, but no newer feature work.
We will announce Xberg v1.0.0 when it's officially published (it's still in RC). The Go module lives at github.com/xberg-io/xberg if you want to try the RC. The new repo is here: https://github.com/xberg-io/xberg
How do I do that?
I have
docker-build:
## Build docker image with the manager.
DOCKER_BUILDKIT=1 $(CONTAINER_TOOL) build --secret id=gh_token,env=GH_TOKEN -t ${IMG} .
in my Makefile and
ENV GOPRIVATE=github.com/user/*
RUN echo "machine github.com" > ~/.netrc
RUN echo "login user" >> ~/.netrc
RUN --mount=type=secret,id=gh_token echo "password $(cat /run/secrets/gh_token)" >> ~/.netrc
in my Dockerfile, but I still get
`fatal: could not read Username for 'https://github.com': terminal prompts disabled`
What can I do?
While going through the generics proposal and the design docs, I found the implementation quite curious.
Go doesn't do full monomorphization like Rust or C++, where a separate copy of the code is generated for every concrete type at compile time. That approach can blow up compile times and binary size.
But it doesn't do full type erasure like Java either, where the generic parameters are erased and values are boxed behind a common type. Erasure cuts down on duplication but adds some runtime overhead.
Instead Go takes a hybrid approach between the two. Type parameters get grouped by GC shape. A GC shape is a grouping of types that can share the same generated code, based on how they're laid out in memory and scanned by the garbage collector.
Two types land in the same shape if they have the same underlying type, or if they're both pointers. Every pointer type, no matter what it points to, shares a single GC shape. Types like int and float64 have different underlying types, so each gets its own shape.
For each shape, the compiler generates a single copy of the function that every type in that shape shares. That's the stenciling part. This shared code still needs some per-type information it can't get from the shape alone, like the concrete type descriptors and method tables. That information lives in a separate table called the dictionary, which gets passed into the generic function as a hidden argument.
So Go does some monomorphization, but not every concrete version of a type parameter is reified. At runtime the shared code reads the concrete type details it needs out of the dictionary. It's a good balance between full monomorphization and complete type erasure.
Did a quick writeup on it. You might find it interesting as well.
| I posted here a few months ago about my weekend project, I got asked why only 30 functions of cuda exists, SO the real answer since it's my learning project I wanted to test and see each function in use, more details in the blog above [link] [comments] |
Hi r/golang,
I’m one of the maintainers of pREST, an open-source Go project that generates a REST API on top of an existing PostgreSQL database - we're also moving to add support for all SQL databases.
We released v2.0.0 and v2.1.0 this week, following six release candidates for 2.0.0
The biggest change is registry-based multi-database and multi-cluster support.
A single pREST instance can now connect to multiple independent PostgreSQL servers, each with its own host, credentials, physical database, and alias:
GET /tenant-a/public/users GET /tenant-b/public/users This is not related to Kubernetes clusters. Each alias can point to a completely different PostgreSQL installation.
Other changes include:
/_ready endpoint that checks every registered databaseslogThe release candidates also included several security fixes and hardening around _returning, _groupby, templates, path parameters, identifiers, and tsquery, along with a fix for JWT enforcement when no key was configured.
Version 2.1.0 adds native, read-only MCP support over HTTP at:
/_mcp It runs within the existing Go server rather than requiring a separate MCP process.
The endpoint currently supports:
initialize tools/list tools/call Available tools include:
prest.list_databases prest.list_schemas prest.list_tables prest.describe_table prest.select_table prest.select.{database}.{schema}.{table} pREST generates schema-aware tools for discovered tables, including typed inputs for columns, filters, ordering, limits, and offsets.
The MCP endpoint intentionally reuses the existing pREST stack:
The first version is read-only while we gather feedback about the safest way to support mutations.
We’re exploring additional SQL adapters, with MySQL/MariaDB, SQLite, and SQL Server as possible next targets.
I’d especially appreciate feedback from the Go community on:
Repository: https://github.com/prest/prest
Technical write-up: https://arxdsilva.com/blog/prest-v2-multi-db-mcp