For the government of Cyprus the relations with Russia “were and remain of strategic importance”, Finance Minister Harris Georgiades said in his address to the business forum on “Russia and Cyprus: Lessons from the crisis and prospects for cooperation” in Moscow.
In his speech, Georgiades said that conditions of stability have been established in Cyprus and confidence in the economy has been restored, thus bringing the country to a path of growth, while the banking sector has been fully reformed and restructured.
The Cypriot Minister also attended the 9th Summit of the Cyprus-Russian Intergovernmental Committee on Economic Cooperation, where together with the Russian Deputy Minister of Economic Development, Nikolay R. Podguzov, they discussed bilateral economic relations and concluded that the momentum created by the visit of President Nicos Anastasiades to Moscow in 2015 was fully exploited by the respective government services and by the business world.
Also discussed during the meeting, attended by representatives of the Cyprus Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Cyprus-Russia Business Association, was the welcome rise of tourism, the liberalisation of air transport, as well as investment initiatives in agriculture and telecommunications.
Referring to the mention of Cyprus in the Panama Papers list of tax havens, Angelos Gregoriades, Chairman of the Cyprus Investment Funds’ Association (CIFA) said that Cyprus is no longer considered an attractive offshore jurisdiction of tax-free status.
“Cyprus is an EU member state, fully harmonised with European taxation regulations, as well as OECD rules on money laundering,” he told the Tass news agency in an interview.
“The legal infrastructure in the area of professional and business services, as wellas the financial sector, has been enhanced, as confirmed by the latest EU, ECB and IMF reports,” he said.
Gregoriades said that Cyprus could become a bridge for investments between Europe and Russia, with the mutual fund companies and fund managers based in Cyprus taking advantages of several benefits, adding that the potential cooperation between the Cyprus and Moscow stock exchanges would allow the smoother flow of funds.
