The sensational golden passport case in Cyprus which took a surprising twist on Wednesday after all charges against lawyer Andreas Pittadjis were dropped is now taking a new dimension, Philenews reports.
And not only because Pittadjis will now take on the role as defence lawyer for one of the defendants – Antonis Antoniou – at the ongoing corruption trial before the Nicosia Assize Court.
The report raised the question: “If the Republic’s Legal Service dropped all charges against Pittadjis because it has now decided that the testimonial material did not justify bringing him before a court – or was not sufficient to convict him – then this means that it was wrong to put him on the dock in the first place?”.
However, it added, there is no official statement from the Attorney General’s side.
At the same time, another question raised is whether the complete acquittal of an accused person will ease the state of play of the remaining individuals facing charges.
Accused now are disgraced former House President Dimitris Syllouris, former Akel MP Christakis Giovannis and Antonis Antoniou who was the CEO at Giovanni Group of Companies focusing on development.
Five are the charges they were slapped with in September 2022 following an expose by Al Jazeera and these related to offences of corruption and conspiracy to defraud.
Al Jazeera’s investigation sparked nationwide fury and protests which led to the Nicolatos investigation into the citizenship-by-investment scheme – known as the ‘golden passports programme’. The controversial scheme has been scrapped.
