Filenews 20 January 2026
[Please note as a translation from Greek some comments are not clear but you can see the issues]
The president of the Police Branch of the ISOTIA guild, Nikos Loizides, lashed out against the leadership of the Police, in relation to Saturday's terrifying incident in Larnaca, asking for the intervention of the President of the Republic, since as he claimed, despite the mapping of organized crime, there is no plan to deal with it. Mr. Loizides' reports that many incidents that have occurred throughout Cyprus lately have remained away from the spotlight so as not to show, as he said, the inability of the leadership of the Police to deal with them, caused a sensation.
"Either you are corrupt or you are sleeping on your feet," said Mr. Loizides, pointing out that "at the moment we are losing 5-0 to the underworld" and warning that the worst is yet to come."
Speaking on Sigma's morning show, he wondered where the 100 police officers saved by the Chief of Police are, indicating that there are similar incidents to Saturday's that are kept away from the public eye. "This happened because there was a video. Do you know how many drinks were made in the last 12 months and kept secret? Shouldn't the journalists find out, shouldn't we show our weakness as the Police, because some people don't take the responsibility to come forward and pull their police officers along?"
He also called on the President of the Republic to convene an extraordinary meeting at the Presidential Palace. "Organized crime works on us, instead of working on it. We take care of colleagues at night so that they don't play with us. They printed our colleague a month ago and it remained hidden. It's not a matter of knowing them and mapping them and going out with rumours that I'm going to take boots out on the streets. Do you have a plan? What is it? Did you move secret services from one province to another at night so that organized crime would not know who will come? And for the legislation they said about the Parliament, there is none that is pending," said Mr. Loizides.
Commenting on yesterday's revelations by Filenews that in Oroklini protection was requested even from kiosks and souvlaki joints, he said: "Let me tell you about the souvlaki and the kiosks. Let me tell them that they care more about some millionaires than about the ordinary people and I'll leave it at that. And when the time comes, I send the message to those who make the decisions that we will talk because today what matters is the public interest and everyone in the Ministry, the Presidential and Parliament, the Police Headquarters would do well to sit down and care about the people and not about some millionaire businessmen. When the time comes, we will say a lot. We should be ashamed today to say that you know we have the organized one mapped, but on the other hand we do not catch up with the events. Do you know what that means? Either you are corrupt or you are sleeping on your feet. At the moment we are losing by 5 nil to the underworld. For the meeting to be held at the Presidential Palace, to set timetables, to put both of their feet in one shoe, because the worst is yet to come," said Mr. Loizides.
He was also very intense about the fact that the Chief of Police and the rest of the leadership did not rush to Larnaca after what unacceptable happened. "This may be a kind of devaluation towards the provinces, i.e. there are still two police forces in Cyprus. The police of the Headquarters, where the services, the elites, the "we order, we know and you mess up the Police Directorates". The Police Directorates are the showcase of the Police and they pull the biggest oar of all," he said.
He also fired at the Minister of Justice, Kostas Fytiris. " However, if I were Minister of Justice, at least I would demand that he stand by me (he means the Chief of Police), not a Mayor. Sometimes I wonder, do we call on the Mayor to help us? What will the Mayor do to me to take out my garbage trucks on the street? That is, we must measure our words and not play communication games. We are the Police, we are the ones who are waiting for the people to enforce the law and we are telling the citizens to help us? What can they help us to protect? Do we have an extortionist department? No, but we proceeded with the FVI", noted Mr. Loizides, who at another point characteristically said: "I publicly tell Mr. Fytiris that he is being mocked, sorry for using such a word", he noted, indicating that "he must understand that daily delinquency is one thing and organized crime is another".
