The efforts by the speaker of the Cypriot parliament, Mr Spyros Kyprianou, to secure the release in Belgrade of the three captured US airmen, which ended in failure last night, have highlighted a relationship less surprising than at first sight.
The Mediterranean island has links with Serbia which go beyond a common Orthodox-Christian heritage. There is money involved, lots of money, and much of it belongs to Mr Milosevic, his family and friends.
In the days before the NATO bombings - a time when hundreds of thousands of Serbs marched in the Yugoslav capital demanding Mr Milosevic's resignation - the word "Cyprus" was heard frequently in whispered conversations about the dictator's wrongdoings. It was usually accompanied by the rubbing together of fingers and thumbs to indicate that hard cash was involved.
Cyprus, to put it simply, is where Mr Milosevic has stashed his ill-gotten gains. Some Western observers believe he and his friends have several billion dollars there.
It should be noted, too, that Cypriots are among the strongest opponents of NATO's Yugoslav campaign. Turkey, a NATO member, invaded Cyprus causing a massive displacement of Greek Cypriots. The rest of NATO looked on and did nothing.
Politically aligned against NATO and coming from the country that is minding the Milosevic family fortune, Mr Kyprianouhad better credentials than most to deal with the Yugoslav President in his albeit failed effort to secure the release of US servicemen.
US News uncovered the flight of vast amounts of money, including $3.8 billion in citizens' foreign-currency deposits seized by the Milosevic government.
International sanctions imposed in 1992 actually helped rather than hindered Mr Milosevic and his supporters. Raw materials were badly needed. Smuggling was the only way to get them and in smuggling there was, as always, a lot of money to be made.
This money and the seized foreign currency made its way from Belgrade to banks in Cyprus and Moscow. The Moscow banks had also developed strong links with Cyprus, and it appears most of the money sent to Russia ended up in Cyprus.
A web of secret accounts was spun from the Nicosia office of the Yugoslav Bank, Beogradska Banka. Political supporters of Mr Milosevic, particularly those connected with state companies, won lucrative contracts. The opposition leader, Mr Zoran Dzindjic, now mayor of Belgrade, exposed a scheme in 1996 in which Milosevic associates made $100 million on dealings in state-owned wheat.
Mr Milosevic, his wife, Mirjana Markovic, and other members of their family have made handsome profits while their citizens' lives deteriorated.
Some events have been reminiscent of the Chicago of the 1930s or the Moscow of the 1990s. One business associate of Mr Milosevic's son, Marko, met his end in a burst of gunfire in the basement car-park of the Sava Centre building in Belgrade.