Alleged rape victim refuses to testify

A 29-year-old taxi-driver from Tsiakkilero village was yesterday acquitted of the alleged rape of a Moldavian artiste after the plaintiff refused to testify against him in court.

State prosecutor Georgios Papaioannou told the Larnaca Assizes that the alleged victim was unwilling to appear before the court.

The court then dismissed the case against Nicos Chrysostomou, who was charged with raping the woman in a forest outside Dhelikipos village in the Larnaca district on November 30, 1997.

Meanwhile, Nicosia police were yesterday investigating a 22-year-old Syrian tourist’s claim she had been abducted and repeatedly raped by a Maronite man married to a Cypriot woman. The woman complained the man had imprisoned her in a house outside Nicosia.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.