The joint statement by the Attorney General and the Assistant Attorney General against the Prisons Directorate raises serious questions, says Democratia presidential candidate Achilleas Demetriades in a written statement.
He also wonders why they chose this strange in content and institutionally unusual action to express generally and vaguely "strong concern and concern about the situation" in the Prisons.
What they describe (drug trafficking, use of mobile phones) are issues that were not suddenly created, but have repeatedly concerned public opinion in the past.
What did the executive power that has been ruling for 10 years and whose two Attorneys General were ministers do about them?
Why have they now recalled "the taking of measures by all competent services"?
Attorney General George Savvidis should answer more specifically: What did he do to solve the problems when he was Minister of Justice?
My position is clear, notes Dimitriadis, adding that the Central Prison Directorate is judged by its work. The Director of Prisons Anna Aristotelous should be evaluated by the competent authorities which in this case is the Ministry of Justice.
Everyone knows that, according to the constitution, the Attorney General is the one who has the exclusive competence to prosecute corruption cases, says Demetriades, adding that the European Commission in its latest annual report on the rule of law in Cyprus, in September 2022, negatively assesses the effectiveness of the Attorney General at the most crucial point. He specifically writes: "in high-level corruption cases, results are lacking" ("results regarding high-level corruption cases are lacking", p. 9 - 10 of the report).
The AG and the Assistant AG cover up their ineffectiveness and appoint 4 criminal investigators for possible offences in the Prisons. But there are reasonable suspicions that all they seek is to force the Prisons Director to resign, Mr Demetriades concludes
Contents of this article including associated images are belongs Cyprus Times
Views & opinions expressed are those of the author and/or Cyprus Times
Source
