The Cyprus Weekly
Friday April 19-25, 1996 page 26
Lambros Lambrou's London Notebook
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AS Lobby for Cyprus prepared for their AGM last night the
campaign group did its best to distance itself from a threatening letter
sent to the Cypriot media in London purporting to be from Lobby. The three-page document put forward extremist nationalistic views that went as far as making threats of violence against active campaigners for Cyprus, including ex-president George Vassiliou, former Cyprus Weekly Correspondent Zenon Stavrinides [1] and Haji-Mike. The bigoted opinions expressed included the following open threat: "Here is a final rallying cry for the True Blue Hellenic believers: Any Greek traitors who have dealings with the Turk Dog should have to endure IRA style punishment beatings. This involves taking a hammer and bashing it very hard on their knee caps. Other less generous souls would have proposed instantaneous death. Dealings with Turks involves the following activities: buying products from the occupied territories; Greeks involved in drugs trading from the occupied territories; visitors to the occupied territories; and, sucking up to the Turkish dog in a spirit of brotherly solidarity. All the above are strictly forbidden!"A Lobby spokesman commented: "Lobby had not authorised and would not authorise such an atrocious and despicable letter. "The bogus document has clearly been designed to in some way to discredit Lobby for Cyprus. "We would like to express our regret that our name has been used in some way to attack the named individuals and we hope that they have not been distressed by the uncalled for, vexatious abuse levelled against them." One of the people named in the letter, constitutional lawyer, Nicos Trimiklinotis told us: "It's important that Lobby for Cyprus expose and hand these people over to the police They are sick people who are not only a danger to themselves, but are, most importantly, a danger to the future of a just Cyprus settlement." A Lobby for Cyprus insider told Cyprus Weekly: "We have a very good idea who the culprits are. They are members of Lobby who have recently shown their true colours and are trying to cause trouble for the organisation. I hope people will rest assured that we will take the necessary steps to get rid of them and their nasty opinions."
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[1] Mr. Zenon Stavrinides (e-mail: ZStavrinides@compuserve.com),
The Secretary,
Association for Cypriot, Greek and Turkish Affairs,
17 Scott Hall Square,
Leeds, LS7 3JN,
United Kingdom.
Tel: +44 (0)113 293 0747