The FINANCIAL — EBRD First Vice President Phil Bennett will visit Cyprus on 29-31 March for meetings with the authorities, the business community and representatives of civil society.
Mr Bennett will meet the President of the Republic of Cyprus, Nicos Anastasiades, Minister of Finance and EBRD Governor Harris Georgiades, and Privatisation Commissionaire Constantinos Herodotou, according to EBRD.
Meetings with representatives of the private sector across the island will serve to deepen the EBRD’s activities in Cyprus where the Bank started investing only last year after a decision by its shareholders in May 2014.
Following this decision the Bank signed its first investment by participating in a capital raise in Bank of Cyprus in July last year. Further projects are currently under preparation. EBRD President Sir Suma Chakrabarti opened the Bank’s Resident Office, headed by Libor Krkoška, in Nikosia in December 2014.
The EBRD’s engagement in Cyprus is temporary and envisaged to last until 2020. According to the decision by its shareholders, the EBRD will operate on the whole territory of Cyprus.
The Bank is focusing on investments in the financial sector, support for privatisations and private concessions, and providing finance to projects of individual private companies. The goal is to support the recovery of the country’s economy which is suffering from a protracted recession following a deep financial crisis.
Cyprus is a founding member of the EBRD and became a shareholder of the Bank in 1991.
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