He faces stiff competition from 2007 world champion, Donald Thomas , of the Bahamas and Cyprus's Kyriakos Ioannou .

BBC: Sport - Commonwealth Games 2010: Form guide - men's field athletics

"We are protesting about pensions, emergency taxes, the high cost of life, " retired factory worker Kyriakos Anastassiadis told the Associated Press.

BBC: Greeks in fresh general strike against austerity

"Everything is at stake, like it has never been before, " Kyriakos Iacovides, publisher of the Cyprus Mail newspaper, told the Reuters news agency.

BBC: Cyprus votes for new president amid economic crisis