Sports body cleared of wrongdoing

But Olympic Committee could still find itself in hot water over other allegations

Nothing untoward was found concerning the conduct of three senior members of the Olympic Committee, the Sports Ethics Committee said on Monday.

In a statement, the ethics committee said it has completed its investigation and handed the findings to the ministry of education and sports.

“Following an exhaustive investigation,” it said, “our two investigating officers unanimously concluded that all the allegations made about the chairman of the Cyprus Olympic Committee Mr Giorgos Chrysostomou, as well as the allegations about the vice-chairman Mr Yiotis Ioannidis and the treasurer Mr Alexandros Christoforou, do not in any way correspond to reality.

“The things they were accused of did not happen, nor did the investigating officers find any evidence that confirms and/or justifies the noise created around the Cyprus Olympic Committee.”

The Sports Ethics Committee stressed that these findings strictly concern the specific allegations heard during two sessions of the House ethics committee taking place on October 25 and November 1 last year.

Those allegations, brought by members of the Olympic Committee’s executive council, related to the non-taking of minutes during meetings. It was also alleged that Olympic Committee chairman Chrysostomou would personally handle grants worth tens of thousands of euro and kept the executive council in the dark about it.

As a result of those allegations, at the time the minister of education and sports had temporarily frozen all funds earmarked for the Olympic Committee.

Now, with the investigation having found nothing untoward, the minister has released those funds.

In the same statement, the Sports Ethics Committee also stated that it will be addressing a letter to the chairman of the Olympic Committee, alerting him to “matters that require prompt correction”.

But separately from this particular investigation, the Olympic Committee could still find itself in hot water. In late November 2023 the attorney-general green-lit a criminal probe into alleged offences committed by an Olympic Committee member.

The subsequent, and ongoing, police investigation is based on other findings of the Sports Ethics Committee, detailing possible financial mismanagement at the Olympic Committee – specifically the expenses incurred during Cyprus’ participation in the Games of the Small States of Europe (GSSE) held in Malta in May last year. The total cost of the Cypriot mission reportedly exceeded previous events’ budgets.

The Sports Ethics Committee had raised concerns about the composition of the Cypriot mission, consisting not only of 187 athletes but an additional 100 individuals, including numerous media representatives. It was further alleged at the time that the Olympic Committee chairman had stayed in a more expensive hotel than the other members of the mission.