Perdikis requests meeting with president over Akamas

Green party leader Giorgos Perdikis on Monday requested to meet with President Nikos Christodoulides over issues that have developed with roadworks in Akamas.

Perdikis formally requested the meeting in a letter to the president, as he is set to visit the area where the roadworks are being conducted.

He recalled the government’s pre-election correspondence to declare the Akamas Peninsula a National Park and a Biosphere Park of international standards and review the decisions of the previous government.

Last week environmental groups BirdLife Cyprus, Terra Cypria, Cyprus Natural Coastline, and the Cyprus Wildlife Society, sent a letter to Agriculture Minister Petros Xenophontos requesting a meeting and slamming a “violation of legally binding, essential, and specific conditions” which were set out when the construction works were approved.

“There has been a clear violation of several conditions, which six of the seven members [of the ad hoc committee for the special ecological assessment] have acknowledged through their own letters,” they said.

The groups’ letter directly contradicts statements made on Thursday by company Efpalinos Meletitiki.

The company had said that the relevant authorities had been “kept informed at all stages of the study and licencing of the project”.

Additionally, the company accused the forestry department of “continuously targeting company employees”.