Empty talk, bluster, and no way out…

Opinion corruptiongovernment Empty talk, bluster, and no way out… Pasxalides Videogate Relevant News Empty talk, bluster, and no way out… 21 July 2026 The unforgettable scent of the night 21 July 2026 Defence disputes drug quantities in Zavrantonas cocaine trial 21 July 2026 Giorgos Kallinikou 21 July 2026 FacebookXWhatsAppEmailPrintViber Empty talk and bluster. Oh, really? For once, a criminal investigator, appointed to look into a scandal or a major case that gripped the whole country (in this instance, the infamous Videogate affair), actually came out and said it that plainly. Empty talk and bluster, then, Mr Paschalides. Because, as you yourself point out, the footage that made it into the public domain wasn’t authentic but the product of editing (spliced together, in other words). As if the terminology you’ve chosen is some minor detail nobody should worry about. Because footage can be spliced, cutting a few clips out of a longer video, without that making it any less authentic. If the video is genuine, then the clips taken from it are genuine too. If splicing happened, it was done to create the picture the people behind it wanted. But what’s said in those clips was actually said, in real life. Empty talk and bluster, then, Mr Paschalides. Because, as you also point out, even the authentic video isn’t free of factors that decisively affect its evidential value (it’s the product of unconstitutional provisions, meaning, presumably, that it was filmed illegally and without the knowledge of those involved). Well, we knew that already. We didn’t need a criminal investigator to tell us that. Your job was to work out how much of the 26 hours of footage holds up, and which parts (if the few minutes that leaked nearly gave the country a heart attack, I dread to think what’s in all those hours). But it looks like that came up empty. Empty talk and bluster, then, Mr Paschalides. The goal, you say, was to damage the Republic of Cyprus through a hybrid attack. Fine, even if it was a hybrid attack, what matters is whether what our adversaries are using against us actually stands up. But it looks like that came up empty too. And if this really was a hybrid attack on Cyprus, then “empty talk and bluster” is far too light a way to describe it. This is too serious for that, Mr Paschalides. Empty talk and bluster, then, Mr Paschalides, and for everything else besides. For everything concerning the people who held institutional roles in government, or who served as ministers in the previous administration, or the Social Welfare Services Agency, and so on. Though I do have one small question. To reach such a staggering conclusion, did you actually open bank accounts, check tax returns, dig into any of it? Because if all you did was take people’s word for what they did or didn’t declare, you’ve got a hard job ahead convincing the public of that. Empty talk and bluster, then, Mr Paschalides. Well then, the President must reinstate Charalambous to his post as head of his office. He must reconstitute the Social Welfare Services Agency, which he decided to dissolve after the infamous video surfaced. Unfortunately, there’s another kind of bluster, one that does far more damage than all of the above put together. This column flagged it just a week ago. And, sadly, yesterday’s announcement by the criminal investigator on the findings of the Videogate case proved us right almost immediately. It concerned the reappointment of Mr Andreas Paschalides for a third five-year term as head of the Independent Authority for the Investigation of Allegations and Complaints Against the Police, running until July 1, 2031 (his previous terms ran from 2016 to 2021, and 2021 to 2026). The decision sparked a strong backlash from political parties and a large section of the public. And rightly so, given that the criminal investigator on a case in which the government itself was under scrutiny had just been reappointed by that very same government. And timed, no less, right around the announcement of his own findings. Was there really such urgency to make that decision at that exact moment? Could nobody on the government’s side see that reappointing him right then would cast a shadow over a case in which the government itself was the subject? Was it really so hard to find someone else for the job? Is it really that difficult, at this point, not to feed the suspicion? These were the questions we were asking a week ago. One glance at social media yesterday, after the findings were made public, was enough to see just how many people viewed the outcome with deep suspicion. Worse still, Mr Paschalides chose to use language in his announcement that echoed the very arguments the government itself had used, fuelling even more doubt. And the phrase “empty talk and bluster” is, frankly, unheard of in a criminal investigator’s findings, doing nothing to lend the report the gravity it needed. The very least that can now be done to clear away even some of these shadows is to publish the full text of the findings. Only then will we know exactly what was investigated, and how. Whether it justifies the bluster. Whether there’s any way out. Do you dare, Mr Paschalides? Do you dare, Attorney General? Do you dare, gentlemen in government? 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