Assassination of Cyprus’ most powerful publisher stirs fears of instability on divided island

Cyprus assassination stirs fears of instability

NICOSIA, Cyprus — The assassination of Cyprus’ most powerful publisher stirred fears of rising instability Tuesday as ethnic Greek and Turkish leaders made a new push to reunify the war-divided Mediterranean island.

Dias publishing group director Andy Hadjicostis, 41, was gunned down Monday night, hours after the Greek Cypriot president and the leader of the island’s breakaway Turkish region launched a new round of negotiations aimed at reuniting the country.

Police said the victim was shot twice — in the back and chest — as he stepped out of his car outside his home in central Nicosia. He died at the scene, a heavily policed upscale area of the Cypriot capital that includes several embassy compounds.

The spokesman said the gunman fled on a motorcycle driven by an accomplice. No shell casings were found.

Police stressed that no evidence of a motive had emerged. But politicians said the crime appeared aimed at spurring instability at a time when the peace talks with Turkish Cypriots have sharpened political divisions between Greek Cypriot liberals and nationalists favoring a harder line.

Former president Tassos Papadopoulos’ corpse was stolen last month from his grave on Nicosia’s outskirts last month. He was seen by some nationalist Greek Cypriots as a symbol of resistance against peace deals they believe have been weighted against them.

Hadjicostis was seen as a rising star in the island’s majority Greek Cypriot community, taking over a media stable founded by his father that includes the conservative daily Simerini, the private Sigma television station, a popular radio station and several magazines.

His newspaper and media were supportive of the broader peace process but had expressed public concern that Christofias could make too many concessions to the Turkish Cypriot side.

A front-page editorial in Simerini suggested Hadjicostis’ murder may have been linked to the theft of Papadopoulos’ corpse.

“Some people don’t want this place to calm down. They don’t want citizens to live in conditions of security and calm,” it said.

Parliament speaker Marios Garoyan said the shooting may have been an attempt to destabilize the island but did not elaborate.

The leader of the island’s Greek Orthodox church, Archbishop Chrysostomos, said that “under no circumstance should we permit the situation from becoming destabilized. Crime and terrorism must not prevail,” he said in a written statement.

Hadjicostis’ murder also follows a spike in violence related to organized crime — including three killings in the coast resort of Limassol since November. But none of the targets have had such a high profile.

This tiny island remains scarred by political and interethnic violence that erupted after independence from Britain in 1960. Cyprus has been split since 1974, when Turkey invaded after a coup by supporters of union with Greece. The island joined the European Union six years ago, but only Greek Cypriots enjoy the benefits of membership.

The island’s president, Dimitris Christofias, took a break from renewed settlement negotiations to visit the victim’s family.

“The police will exhaust all their resources to solve this horrible crime,” Christofias said. “These are like scenes from an ancient tragedy … The family’s pain is unfathomable.”

Conspiracy theories are common in Cyprus and Nicosia University professor Hubert Faustmann said Greek Cypriots were gripped by a sense of insecurity.

“Nobody can make plausible sense of this … other than to spread insecurity and to get everyone suspecting everyone else,” he said.

Hadjicostis, survived by his wife and two stepchildren, will be buried Wednesday.