Syrian war missile hits Cyprus
A missile from the Syrian civil war that was presumably misdirected landed around 20 kilometres from the Cypriot capital Nikosia on Sunday night, setting fire to a hill in occupied Northern Cyprus. No one was hurt. Are Syria's neighbours aware of how close this war is?
Enough of looking the other way!
The missile crash will finally shake the Cypriots from their apathy, columnist Şener Levent hopes in Politis:
“What a relief that a small missile has roused us from our slumber! We've finally understood that we're inside the war zone, not outside it. ... We're not interested in people who are being slaughtered in Syria nor in women who're being put in chains and sold for five or ten dollars, nor in cities that are being turned into ruins. We've looked on indifferently at the pool of blood all around us, and got used to reading news about the thousands of refugees drowning at sea.”
Keep image loss to a minimum
It's important not to make too much of a fuss over a missile fired from so far away, Phileleftheros writes:
“The Cypriot economy is service-dependent, and such events are only harmful when they get too much media attention. Foreign investors or tourists won't be able to measure distances and see that this an extremely rare occurrence. So the key thing is how we react here in Cyprus. Everything depends on how long this stays in the news and how much it gets blown out of proportion. Our first reaction is always overreaction. That's another example of our self-destructive mentality.”