Bailiffs try to seize two ministry vehicles in compensation row

BAILIFFS turned up at the Interior Ministry to seize two “official service” vehicles after the state failed to pay £560,000 in damages awarded by a court in a property case.

The judicial process that was launched in 2014 over land in Lefkoşa belonging to Maronite Ninos Andonis Yiamakis, which was given by the government to a Turkish Cypriot as “exchange” land in 1986, concluded in 2019.

Lefkoşa District Court ruled that Yiamakis’s heirs should be paid £560,000 in damages for loss of the land on Bedrettin Demirel Caddesi, on which a petrol station currently exists.

But as the heirs of Mr Yiamakis

have yet to receive a penny of the compensation awarded, debt enforcement officers were sent to the Interior Ministry, reports said.

However, lawyer Öncel Polili stated that the sequestration was postponed after being told that partial payment would be made.

Referring to the litigation process, Mr Polili said that Maronite-owned land and properties do not fall under the scope of “exchange” properties, known in Turkish as “eş değer”, whereby Turkish Cypriots in the past were given land or buildings vacated by Greek Cypriots in exchange for land and property of equivalent value they had left behind in South Cyprus after 1974.

Mr Polili said that during all discussions with the authorities since the court awarded the damages in 2019, his clients were told the money will be paid “today or tomorrow” but that had not received any payment to date, so they sent a debt enforcement officer to the Interior Ministry.

Stating that during a meeting it was advised that a “partial payment” would be made, Mr Polili said he was informed that the remaining amount would be paid “immediately after the New Year” and that for this reason the sequestration was postponed.