Dimitris Christofias
| Demetris Christofias | |
|---|---|
| Δημήτρης Χριστόφιας | |
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| 6th President of Cyprus | |
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In office 28 February 2008 – 28 February 2013 |
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| Preceded by | Tassos Papadopoulos |
| Succeeded by | Nicos Anastasiades |
| 9th President of the House of Representatives | |
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In office 7 June 2001 – 28 February 2008 |
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| Preceded by | Spyros Kyprianou |
| Succeeded by | Marios Garoyian |
| 4th General Secretary of the Progressive Party of Working People |
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In office 22 April 1988 – 21 February 2009 |
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| Preceded by | Ezekias Papaioannou |
| Succeeded by | Andros Kyprianou |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
29 August 1946 Dikomo, Cyprus |
| Political party | Progressive Party of Working People |
| Spouse(s) | Elsie Chiratou |
| Children | Marianna Christina Christos |
| Alma mater | Russian Academy of Sciences |
| Signature |  |
Demetris Christofias, also spelled Dimitris Christofias (Greek: Δημήτρης Χριστόφιας [ðiˈmitɾis xɾiˈstofças]; born 29 August 1946), is a Greek Cypriot former politician who was the sixth President of Cyprus from 2008 to 2013. Christofias was the General Secretary of AKEL, the Communist Party of Cyprus, and was the European Union's and Cyprus' first, and so far only, Communist head of state. He won the 2008 Cypriot presidential elections in the second round of voting. Throughout the election campaign, he pledged to restart talks with Turkish Cypriots in order to find a solution to the Cyprus dispute and reunify the island. He has also supported the closure of the British military bases on Cyprus.
Demetris Christofias was born in Dhikomo in the Kyrenia District of Cyprus, in the area that has been under military occupation by Turkey since 1974. He received his secondary-school education at Nicosia Commercial Lyceum, from which he graduated in 1964. At the age of 14, he joined the progressive secondary-school students organisation, PEOM, and at the age of 18, he joined EDON (AKEL's United Democratic Youth Organisation), PEO Trade Unions, and AKEL. In 1969, at the 5th Congress of EDON, he was elected member of the Central Council.
Christofias spent five years in Moscow in the Soviet Union where he studied at the Institute of Social Sciences, Academy of Social Sciences, from which he received a degree in history. In addition to his native Greek, he speaks Russian and English. In Moscow he met his wife and later returned to Cyprus and political life. Christofias married Elsi Chiratou in 1972 and they have three children: two daughters, Marianna and Christina; and a son, Christos. He is allegedly an atheist, a public pronouncement unprecedented by a political leader in overwhelmingly Orthodox Cyprus.
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