President Nikos Christodoulides is set to chair another meeting over the sanctions on Tuesday, broadening attendees to include professional bodies and regulators.
Set to take begin at 10.30am at the presidential palace, the ministers of finance and justice will be attending as will the central bank of Cyprus governor, chairman of the Cyprus securities and exchange commission (Cysec), the Cyprus bar association and institute of certified public accountants.
Chairman of the bar association Christos Clerides told the Cyprus News Agency on Monday they would be asking for a formal briefing “because we haven’t had one yet. Our information was gathered through different media reports and announcements”
He stressed that Cypriot lawyers are bound only by EU and UN sanctions and not by UK and US ones.
Should evidence indicate any member of the bar association has violated the sanctions, an on-site audit will take place and administrative sanctions will be imposed. Criminal sanctions are imposed by the legal service, he specified.
“All we have so far is the announcement and justification behind the measures that the British and Americans took. So far, we have not received any information that the sanctioned law office violated EU sanctions.”
The law office in question is the Vassiliades firm, sanctioned by both US and UK.
The government said the much-anticipated evidence will arrive imminently but not in one tranche.
Clerides stressed neither the US or UK specified word for word that the sanctioned individuals violated sanctions. “They simply say this is an effort to tear down the financial network system of sanctioned individuals.”
Nonetheless, he added the bar association had a meeting with the US Ambassador as soon as the issue became public. “We asked to have any evidence and we were told it would be given to Cypriot authorities and we would take it from there.”
Where Vassiliades’ law firm is concerned, Clerides said he asked the lawyer to prepare a report of everything that concerns the case with Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov until May 5 and provide evidence.
Vassiliades has since informed him the report is already prepared, Clerides said.
“We will evaluate it and decide accordingly.”
Clerides also said he was concerned by statements US Ambassador Julie Fisher made in an interview on Friday, that referred to planning on a bilateral level between Cyprus’ government and that of the US.
“If this was a mutual partnership, I do not know why the government is asking for the evidence.”
Clerides was suggesting that the ambassador’s statements implied the government may have been actively involved in the preparations of sanctions, something to which the bar association would be asking for clarification, he specified.
The Cyprus Mail understands the ambassador was referring to a broader collaboration with the EU, G7 as well as Cyprus at a bilateral level, to develop targeted measures combating sanctions evasion.
