Cyprus suspended three senior army officers on Tuesday in the wake of a naval base munitions blast that killed 13 people, destroyed the country's largest power plant and sparked a political crisis. The three were suspended as part of a disciplinary inquiry into how seized containers loaded with munitions were precariously stashed at the base and ultimately exploded, the defence ministry said.
A fourth person, a Greek officer serving with the National Guard, was transferred from the naval base, the ministry said. The action takes the number of people suspended to seven following similar actions last week against four fire service officers.
The suspensions come with President Demetris Christofias yet to choose a new cabinet after calling on all his ministers to resign when his junior coalition partner, centre-right party Diko, called for a reshuffle. Christofias is in consultation with Diko, which wants to reset the communist-led government's manifesto based on tougher economic austerity measures and a less compromising stance on the island's decades-old division.
The president and his administration has been under fire over their perceived incompetence in preventing the July 11 blast, with the loss of the nearby power plant sparking daily nation-wide power cuts. Indecision and political instability have prompted two international ratings agencies - S&P and Moody's - to downgrade the Cyprus economy over debt fears compounded by the blast aftershock. Leaked documents in the media indicate that officials knew that the 98 shipping containers of confiscated Iranian munitions - piled up in the blazing sun at the base near the coastal city of Limassol - could explode.
The government insists Christofias was never made aware of the risk. Since the blast, crowds have gathered almost nightly outside the presidential palace to call on Christofias to resign over the island's worst peace-time military disaster. Both the defence minister and the head of the national guard resigned within hours of the explosion.
The containers had been at the base since their seizure in February 2009 when Cyprus intercepted, under pressure from the United States and other Western nations, a Cypriot-flagged freighter bound from Iran for Syria. Angry Cypriots have used social networking sites to organise the largest rallies the island has seen to protest at alleged government negligence. The rolling power cuts have come during a scorching summer heat wave. Israel, the United States and Greece have provided generators to help the island cope.
The breakaway Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is also sending electricity south, transmitting around 100 megawatts. Cyprus has been divided along ethnic lines since 1974, when Turkish troops occupied its northern third in response to an Athens-engineered coup in Nicosia aimed at union with Greece.