Praxoula Antoniadou

Praxoula Antoniadou-Kyriacou is a Cypriot politician. She currently holds the post of the President of the United Democrats, the Liberal pro-solution party of Cyprus, since September 2008. She has also held the post of the Minister of Commerce, Industry and Tourism of Cyprus. She has currently resumed office as managing director of ChangeWays Consultancy Ltd, while she has also announced her candidacy for the Cyprus presidential elections of February 2013.

Education and Career

Praxoula Antoniadou-Kyriacou was born in Nicosia where she attended the English School. She obtained her BSc and MSc in Economics at the London School of Economics.

Following her studies, she started working at the Central Bank of Cyprus. She held a managerial position with the Central Bank, where she served for 24 years. During her work at the central bank, she was engaged in macroeconomic analysis, policy formulation and management, and in statistics. She was also highly involved in European Union matters and served as coordinator of the Central Bank of Cyprus during the five-year period of the accession negotiations. She has also served as member of various committees of the European Central Bank and of EUROSTAT.

Throughout her career, Antoniadou-Kyriacou participated in a number of seminars and courses at the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank, EUROSTAT, the US Federal Reserve, the Bank of England, the Swiss National Bank and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, as well as in seminars on management issues (CIIM, Dale Carnegie).

She is a member of the three ladies team of economists who have co-authored the award winning trilogy of studies on “The Day After’’1, concerning the economic benefits to accrue to all the Cypriots, as well as to Turkey and Greece once Cyprus is reunited.

Political career

In her capacity as the President of the United Democrats, she has worked within the political family of the European Liberal Democrats trying to promote the implementation of Liberal values such as freedom, democracy and respect of human rights. In accordance with the above, the United Democrats appreciated the unanimous adoption by the European Liberal, Democrat and Reform Party, in their November 2009 Barcelona Congress, of a resolution expressing support to the efforts for the attainment of an agreed solution to the Cyprus problem that will be reunifying Cyprus on the basis of a bizonal bicommunal federation.

As President of the United Democrats, Antoniadou-Kyriacou had participated in meetings organized in Istanbul by GPoT Center, TESEV and the German Liberals’ Friedrich Naumann Stiftung, aiming at building communication bridges between Greek and Turkish Cypriots and, especially, between Cyprus and Turkey.In the context of these meetings, she had the opportunity to meet with His-All Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, as well with the Turkish Prime Minister Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

She has also been a regular and active participant of the meetings of the leaders of the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot political parties meeting at Ledra Palace.

In late 2012 Antoniadou-Kyriacou announced her intention to be a candidate for the Cypriot Presidential elections of 2013, running with the support of her party, the United Democrats.

Personal life

Praxoula Antoniadou-Kyriacou is married to Lysandros Kyriacou and has two children, Semeli and Theodoros. She has a keen interest in music and she is an accomplished flautist. As an amateur musician she has participated in the television charity show 'DanSing for You' in order to help children battling cancer.

Offices Held

References

1The reports were published by PRIO, the Norwegian Peace and Research Institute. The authors, Özlem Oğuz Çilsal, Fiona Mullen and Praxoula Antoniadou Kyriacou received a Stelios Award for Business Co-operation in Cyprus. Download: The Day After - http://www.prio.no/upload/Report-The%20day%20after.pdf Download: The Day After II - http://www.prio.no/upload/The%20day%20after-2%20ENG-web.pdf Download: The Day After III - http://www.prio.no/upload/The%20day%20after%20III.pdf