RAF flies in cash for Cyprus Brits

Members of the Cypriot parliament have voted against a crucial plan to seize a part of depositors' bank savings
20 March 2013

A plane carrying one million euro (£852,600) has touched down in Cyprus as part of a "contingency measure" to help troops and their families.

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) said the RAF flight will provide people with emergency loans in the event that cash machines and debit cards stop working completely.

The MoD stressed it was determined to minimise the impact of the Cyprus banking crisis on "our people" and it will consider further shipments if required.

The aircraft, which landed at 7.50pm UK time on Tuesday night, arrived just hours after the Cypriot parliament rejected a critical draft Bill that would have seized part of people's bank deposits.

Cyprus will now have to come up with an alternative plan to raise the money to qualify for a vital international bailout or the country could go bankrupt. Government had re-assured British troops posted to Cyprus they will be fully compensated for any plans to raid their savings.

As well as sending out the emergency fund, the MoD asked personnel if they would prefer this and future months' salaries to be paid into UK bank accounts.

It said in a statement: "An RAF flight left for Cyprus this afternoon with one million euro on board as a contingency measure to provide military personnel and their families with emergency loans in the event that cash machines and debit cards stop working completely. We will keep this under review and consider further shipments if required.

"The MoD is proactively approaching personnel to ask if they want their March, and future months' salaries paid into UK bank accounts, rather than Cypriot accounts. We're determined to do everything we can to minimise the impact of the Cyprus banking crisis on our people."

The position of more than 3,000 British service personnel was thrown into doubt on Monday when Treasury Minister Greg Clark only went as far as saying that they would not suffer "unreasonable losses" as a result of the planned levy.

However, George Osborne told Cabinet that UK Armed Forces personnel and civil servants posted to Cyprus will be "compensated in full" for any losses as a result of the planned levy on savings.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in