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- Ελληνικά
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I would like to welcome you and express the gratitude of the Republic of Cyprus to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and the Royal Jordanian Air Force for responding positively to our invitation by making available two firefighting helicopters with their crews.
The firefighting helicopters will remain in the country with their 18-member crew, at least until the arrival of the aircraft leased by the Republic of Cyprus, joining forces with the Forestry Department and relevant agencies in the effort to effectively respond to the fires.
Training of the crews starts today and the helicopters will be operationally ready for firefighting in the next 24 hours.
I would like to personally thank the Minister of Defence, Mr. Vassilis Palma, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Konstantinos Kombos, the Chief of the National Guard, Mr. Georgios Tsitsikostas, the Directorate of Forestry and Civil Defence, the Ambassador of Cyprus to Jordan, Mr. Michael Ioannou, for their assistance in completing the procedures and the arrival of the helicopters in Cyprus.
At the same time, I would like to mention that thanks to the positive response of the Minister of Defence, the Minister of Justice Mr. Marios Hartsiotis and the Commander of the British Bases Mr. Peter Squires, it was ensured that at least one of the two aircraft of each service is available on a 24-hour basis for firefighting purposes with a response time of about 30 minutes. At the same time we are in contact with neighbouring and other countries that are at our disposal in case we need to provide flight assets.
Once again, we note that for the Republic of Cyprus the prevention of fires and their timely response is a matter of National Security. It is for this reason that the Government is proceeding with the purchase of ten privately owned aircraft and with the transfer of the Aviation Unit to the National Guard.
With regard to the operational readiness of the Republic of Cyprus for fire prevention and extinguishing, it is recalled that in addition to the flying assets (Department of Forests, Jordan, National Guard, Police and British Bases), the ground forces of the Forestry Department have been reinforced and in full readiness since 1 April (instead of 1 May, as was the case in other years), while the Fire Service, Civil Defence, the Provincial Administrations and the Game and Wildlife Service are also on standby.
(NΓian/EP)
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