Police have swooped on the town of Chlorakas near Paphos in a hunt for illegal immigrants. According to the police, teams of law enforcement personnel began searching homes at dawn on Sunday, in an operation which lasted until lunchtime.
The notorious Saint Nicholas apartment complex was also searched, but was found to be completely empty.
During Sunday’s raid, 40 people were questioned and had their documents inspected but there were no arrests.
Residents of the town have complained they are on the ‘front line’ of immigration – last summer police arrested four people connected to violent clashes that erupted after an ‘anti-ghettoisation’ protest in Chlorakas.
As it stands, Cypriot authorities are grappling with a new wave of sea immigrants arriving from Syria.
Within 24 hours last week, at least seven small boats, transporting an estimated 500 Syrian immigrants, made landfall or were intercepted off Cyprus’s southeastern coast by marine police patrol boats, reports indicate.
The problem of the increased flows of irregular immigrants, from Lebanon to Cyprus, will be raised today by the President…
Another two boats with irregular immigrants arrived in Cyprus during the night carrying 68 illegal immigrants, 67 from Syria and…
