Three protesters were released late Sunday after being charged following their arrest at an anti-racism demonstration in central Nicosia, amid outrage over police conduct and claims of heavy-handed tactics against demonstrators.
Two women, aged 31 and 32, face five joint charges including illegal assembly, public insult, causing disturbance, breach of peace, failure to provide identification documents and resisting arrest, police said. The 31-year-old woman faces two additional charges of assaulting and obstructing a police officer.
Police also detained a 66-year-old man who is being investigated for alleged violations of data protection laws. His mobile phone was seized as evidence for allegedly recording the event.
The charges against the women reportedly stem from anti-police slogans shouted through a megaphone, which police say were repeated by the second woman.
The demonstration, which drew about 300 participants began peacefully at 12:30 p.m. After its end, around 2 p.m., when protesters had already dispersed, police grabbed and arrested two women on the pretext of insulting officers and causing disturbance. The two women were then taken to Nicosia’s central police station in Lycavittos, where they were held until approximately 7:30 p.m.
The male protester was arrested shortly after and detained at Nicosia’s Crime Investigation Department until around 8 p.m.
Police files on both cases will be completed once examinations conclude, with court proceedings to follow.
Activists speak out against police tactics
After the arrests, protesters held a peaceful sit-in demonstration outside the Ledra Police Station, demanding the activists released. They said that the pretext police gave for the arrests was weak, claiming that the women did not insult the officers, while the 66-year-old man was filming in a public space.
One protester, who identified himself only as Nikos, described being threatened with arrest over protest chants. “During the demonstration we shouted the chant ‘cops pigs killers’. The police officers and their commander approached me and said I would be charged and appear in court,” he said. “I told him ‘about what?’ He told me that ‘you shouted that chant’. I asked him if it is illegal to shout specific chants? He said yes.”
The leftist group afoa which took part in the protest, today released a video of the moment of the arrest, disputing the police’s account that the woman resisted arrest.
The protest, organised by the Initiative Against Border Violence, came in response to the killing of Shoaib Khan, a migrant from Pakistan, by a Cyprus Police officer on January 6.
This is the second arrest of peaceful protesters in four months by Cyprus Police. On October 1, during the Independence Day parade, officers arrested journalist George Tattis and activist Oz Karahan after attempting to display a banner reading “Cyprus Republic: The Only Solution”.
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