General News
Meropi Kyriacou Honored as TNH Educator of the Year
NEW YORK – Meropi Kyriacou, the new Principal of The Cathedral School in Manhattan, was honored as The National Herald’s Educator of the Year.
NICOSIA, Cyprus — U.S. Vice President Joe Biden has underscored Cyprus’ potential to become a key provider of natural gas to Europe, saying that newly discovered offshore reserves of the fossil fuel represented a unique opportunity for the divided island nation.
“Cyprus is poised to become a key player … transforming the eastern Mediterranean into a new global hub for natural gas,” Biden said as he toasted his host, CyprusPresident Nicos Anastasiades, at lunch in the Presidential palace.
Anastasiades said the gas deposits, which also have been found in Israeli waters, can offer “an alternative energy corridor leading to increased energy security.”
The West wants to develop alternative suppliers of natural gas for Europe. Russia, the current top supplier, has threatened it could cut supplies or raise prices to European customers as part of diplomatic rifts over Ukraine.
Biden pledged U.S. government support for efforts to reunify the island. In 1974, Turkey invaded after a coup by supporters of union with Greece. For the past four decades the island has remained divided into a breakaway Turkish Cypriot north and an internationally recognized Greek Cypriot south.
Turkey, which doesn’t recognize Cyprus’ sovereignty, has voiced strong opposition to Greek Cypriot claims to the natural gas fields. It has repeatedly sent warship-escorted research vessels into Cypriot waters, where oil and gas companies are currently surveying, to underscore their own claim.
Only Turkey recognizes a 1983 Turkish Cypriot declaration of independence and maintains 35,000 troops in the north.
Turkish Cypriot leader Dervis Eroglu, who met separately with Biden, said afterward that Turkish Cypriots are entitled to the potential mineral bounty and asserted that “the world accepts that.”
Anastasiades said he had “no doubt” that strong U.S. support would help secureCyprus’ rights to exploit its natural resources over Turkish objections.
Biden later dined together with Anastasiades and Eroglu at a restaurant inside the United Nations-controlled buffer zone dividing the capital, Nicosia. He said both leaders had agreed to speed up renewed peace negotiations.
Analysts say Israel, which already has developed natural gas fields in its waters, may want to utilize Cyprus as a terminus for future pipelines as its own industry expands in the eastern Mediterranean.
A reunified Cyprus would make it easier for Israeli and Cypriot gas exports to reach Europe through Turkey.
NEW YORK – Meropi Kyriacou, the new Principal of The Cathedral School in Manhattan, was honored as The National Herald’s Educator of the Year.
CLOSTER, NJ – The well-attended Greek Independence Day Celebration in Closter, NJ, took place on March 25, beginning with the Flag Raising Ceremony at Ruckman Park in Closter.
ALBANY – New York State Assemblyman Michael Tannousis (R, C-Staten Island/Brooklyn) on March 26 was joined in Albany by His Eminence Archbishop Elpidophoros of America to recognize Greek Independence Day and the 50th anniversary of the illegal Turkish invasion and continued occupation of Cyprus.
ATHENS - Historic member of PASOK and passionate advocate of the recognition of Pontian Greek genocide Michalis Charalambidis died on Wednesday aged 73.
ATHENS - While the New Democracy government denied audio files from the 2023 head-on train crash in Tempe which killed 57 had been tampered with, five managers at the state-run OSE railways agency reportedly had access to them.
FAIRVIEW, NJ – The Greek Cypriots of New Jersey under the auspices of the Federation of Cypriot American Organizations, the Consulate General of the Republic of Cyprus in New York and Consul General of Cyprus Michalis Firillas will commemorate the 69th Anniversary of the EOKA Liberation Struggle of Cyprus from British Colonial Rule 1955-1959, with a memorial service at the Greek Orthodox Church of the Ascension, 101 Anderson Avenue in Fairview, NJ, on Sunday, March 31.