The European Commission is set to reject Cyprus’s request for a derogation from mandatory culling rules for foot-and-mouth disease, farming organisations said on Friday after meeting EU Health and Animal Welfare Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi in Nicosia.
Várhelyi is in Cyprus for a series of crisis meetings, during which he is expected to give an official response to Nicosia’s request to deviate from EU Regulation 2020/687, which requires the slaughter of all animals in infected units.
Michalis Lytras, honorary president of the Panagrotic Union of Cyprus (PEK), said the meeting produced nothing beyond what farmers had already been told by the minister.
The commissioner, Lytras said, “simply repeated that the existing regulation on these matters will be applied without any relaxation,” and that the EU would provide whatever assistance the regulation allows.
Panikos Hambas, Secretary-General of the Union of Cypriot Farmers (EKA), told Phileleftheros the meeting “had no positive development,” adding that farmers were waiting to see what the President of the Republic would say at an afternoon meeting at the Presidential Palace.
Várhelyi began his visit at the ZENON Coordination Centre at Larnaca Airport, where he met Agriculture Minister Maria Panayiotou and representatives of affected livestock units.
He later held talks with farming organisations, producer representatives, and officials from relevant state services, and is scheduled to meet political party representatives before being received at the Presidential Palace, where he will make a statement.
According to Phileleftheros sources, information from Brussels over the previous 24 hours had been discouraging for farmers. Sources said a derogation was considered extremely difficult to impossible, as no such exemption had ever been granted for similar cases within the EU.
The Commission, sources said, examined Cyprus’s specific circumstances — including its geographic isolation and small production scale — but appears to be holding firm on strict application of Regulation 2020/687. Even the President’s direct intervention with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen does not appear capable of changing the outcome, according to sources.
