Yiannaki case to go to legal service in May, police say

The case of former Volunteerism Commissioner Yiannis Yiannaki who faces 18 charges relating to the alleged forgery of his high school and university diplomas will be referred to the legal service next month, police said on Thursday.

Speaking to the media, police spokesman Christos Andreou said the case is expected to be sent to the legal service for further instructions in early May. This is despite the US university from where Yiannaki presented a diploma to get a government post has yet to respond.

“The required testimony needed to charge and prosecute him has been secured,” Andreou said.

He clarified the US university from where Yiannaki allegedly graduated has still not responded regarding the authenticity of the degree and added that it seems the response from the US authorities has been delayed.

However, without going into detail, Andreou said there is other testimony against Yiannaki, hence it was decided to proceed with the case.

“We should mention that apart from the testimony that is expected from abroad, there is other testimony, which exists against this person, but you understand that we cannot go into the substance of the case nor the testimonial material since the case is expected to be brought before a court.

“There were objective problems in the investigation in terms of securing the testimony needed from abroad, but time had passed, and this decision had to be taken in order to proceed,” he said.

Yiannaki was officially charged on Wednesday in relation to the alleged forgery of his academic documents which led him to resign from his post in 2021 amid a police investigation ordered by the auditor general.

He hit headlines in May 2021 after local media revealed he had been at the centre of a probe triggered by allegations he had forged his high school and university diplomas.

News about the auditor general’s letter was reported by Phileleftheros which also published a photograph of the English translation of Yiannaki’s secondary school diploma. This showed a mismatch between the grades of several subjects written out in numbers and in letters, suggesting they had been tampered with.

According to the newspaper, the degree from a US university also appears to be problematic.

Both qualifications were in Yiannaki’s files at the Youth Board of Cyprus (Onek) where he was first appointed in 1996, securing a permanent job in 2007.  President Anastasiades appointed him commissioner in May 2013.

In his letter to the chief of police, Auditor General Odysseas Michaelides had said that after an anonymous complaint claiming that Yiannaki does not have a university degree, his office had carried out checks of his files at Onek and found that the English translation of Yiannakis’ secondary school diploma had been tampered with. For example, for modern Greek, the diploma reads ‘thirteen’ but the number next to it has been changed to 19. Under the subject ‘English’, it was also written out as ‘Thirteen’ but the number next to it said ‘19’. In both instances, it appears the 3 in the 13 had been crudely changed to a 9.

His overall grade also appeared to have been amended.

According to Phileleftheros, the auditor-general had also cited a very low-quality copy of the university degree that does not provide the anticipated information such as the grade, raising questions and doubts. There are also discrepancies in number of years he attended university in various documents in his files.

The auditor general asked Yiannaki to submit any information he may have proving he had a university degree and informing him that if doubts persist, police would be notified.

Yiannaki sent the auditor-general a copy of an English translation of his secondary school diploma with a different grade from that in his files and a copy of his university degree, again different from that in his file.

In his letter, the auditor-general asked police to investigate possible forgery of the secondary school diploma in Yiannaki’s Onek file, possible forgery of the two university degrees (that in the file and that later sent to his office), circulating forged documents and submitting false information to the auditor general.