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Cyprus denies reports about Russian military facilities in exchange for loan

Xinhua, February 27, 2015 Adjust font size:

Cyprus on Thursday dismissed international press reports that it offered Russia a naval base in return for the restructuring of an outstanding 2.5-billion-euro loan (about 2.80 billion U.S. dollars).

"These reports are utterly unfounded and are not based on fact," government spokesman Nicos Christodoulides told state television from Moscow.

He said Russia and Cyprus updated and upgraded an existing defense cooperation agreement which already contained a provision for the docking of Russian warships in Cypriot ports on certain occasions. Endit