By Agence France-Presse, Updated: 7/11/2011
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Dozen killed as Iran arms explode at Cyprus naval base
Huge blasts in a seized Iranian weapons cache at a Greek Cypriot naval base in the south of the Mediterranean island killed at least 12 people on Monday, state media said.
The explosions devastated the adjacent Vassiliko power station -- the island's largest which accounts for almost 50 percent of supply -- triggering electricity outages across large swathes of Cyprus.
They also caused massive damage to homes in the nearby village of Mari, forcing the evacuation of its population of 150 people, its mukhtar or headman, Nikos Asprou, told AFP.
The state CNA news agency said the death toll might rise as an unverified number of people were still posted as missing at the blast site which had been reduced to scorched earth.
Both CNA and public radio reported that Greek Cypriot National Guard commanders had expressed growing concern in recent weeks over the conditions of storage of the Iranian arms cache seized from a Cyprus-flagged ship headed for Syria in 2009. Firefighters were called to tackle a small fire in the storage area at 4:24 am (0124 GMT) and the explosions followed at 5:50 am (0250 GMT), public radio reported.
Five firefighters were among the dead, who also included four National Guard members and two sailors. There was no immediate word on the identity of the 12th fatality.
A total of 59 people were injured in the blast, the health ministry said. Three of those were undergoing emergency surgery for serious injuries.
An AFP correspondent saw magazine casings, shrapnel and other debris from the explosion littered throughout the village of Mari. Windows and doors were blown in, some roofs had collapsed and structural damage was widespread.
Debris was hurled over a radius of as much as three kilometres (two miles) from the seat of the blast in the Evangelos Florakis naval base between Mari and the fishing village of Zygi further west, the correspondent reported.
Hundreds of trees on nearby hillsides were flattened by the force of the blast and several of the generator buildings and fuel tanks at the Vassiliko plant were reduced to shells.
Virtually every window was blown in Zygi, a village whose seafront fish restaurants are popular with locals and the many tourists who frequent the resort island.
The main motorway connecting the capital Nicosia with the island's second-largest city Limassol runs less than a kilometre (half a mile) from the Vassiliko plant and passing motorists reported seeing debris flying through the air.
State television broadcast images of damaged vehicles, twisted road signs and debris strewn across the central reservation.
National Guard chief Petros Tsaliklides told public radio that the blasts struck among containers of Iranian munitions seized from Cypriot-flagged vessel M/V Monchegorsk in 2009.
It was intercepted in the eastern Mediterranean en route to Syria in January that year and, after repeated searches, its cargo was eventually seized.
A UN Security Council panel concluded that March that the shipment was in clear violation of an arms embargo against Iran adopted as part of UN sanctions imposed over Tehran's controversial nuclear programme and the seized weapons were put into storage.
The Iranian ambassador visited the Cypriot presidential palace in Nicosia for a 20-minute meeting after the blast, public radio reported.
It said that senior Guards commanders had met with government officials last week to express their concern about the storage of the seized weapons cache in the open air as temperatures have touched 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit).
Base personnel had been forced to sprinkle the weapons with water after some gunpowder ignited in the tinder-dry conditions, CNA said.
President Demetris Christofias visited the blast scene ahead of an emergency cabinet meeting.
"I want to express my sympathy and condolences to the families of the people who died while selflessly performing their duty," he said. "The material damage can be repaired, but lives do not come back."
The chairman of the Electricity Authority of Cyprus, Charis Thrassou, warned that it would take a long time to repair the Vassiliko plant and added that that an emergency rationing plan would be put to ministers.
"Unfortunately it appears that the disaster is much larger than we initially expected," he told CNA after a site visit.
The loss of supply also prompted the closure of the island's desalination plants which had allowed the gradual abandonment of summer water rationing over the past two years.
At the island's main international airport in Larnaca, morning flights were severely disrupted. When they returned to usual, passengers were forced to cope with severely reduced air conditioning in the terminals.
There was no immediate word on any damage to naval vessels at the Evangelos Florakis base but officials who visited spoke of a scene of "devastation".
