CBA President: Employees of sanctioned law firms and their clients have not been paid

At least 350 employees of local companies belonging to a group impacted by UK and US sanctions have yet to be paid for April, Cyprus Bar Association (CBA) President Christos Clerides has revealed.

Clerides told the Cyprus News Agency that the issue had come to his attention after CBA members revealed they did not receive their salaries at the end of April.

He said that, apart from lawyers, administrative and other staff members had also been impacted, as well as workers at a winery and restaurant belonging to the same group of companies, “As a result, a wide number of workers are affected.”

“They have been affected because the banks have frozen all the group’s accounts,” Clerides said, adding, “These come to about 350 people including a smaller number of lawyers and administrative staff.” The majority of the 350 are not lawyers, Clerides clarified.

He also noted that lawyers’ clients’ companies had also been affected and their bank accounts frozen wherever the sanction-impacted lawyers provided them with management consulting services or their firms offered clients administrative services. To have their accounts unfrozen, the companies had to officially break ties with the firms, by transferring shares and signing relevant forms among other legal obligations.

This also resulted in the Registrar of Companies seeking the advice of the Law Office of the Republic on whether these changes in the companies’ status should be permitted, something Clerides noted has resulted in further delays and workers at these companies also not getting paid.

“The banks must then decide if they will unfreeze the assets. The banks have said they are only bound by commercial practices,” Clerides said, noting, “So it is easy to see that the extent of the problem is enormous.”

Calling on the state to take action, he added that if the issue was not resolved soon, people would begin to be made redundant or fired and the state obliged to pay for their redundancy or unemployment.

(Source: InBusinessNews)