AN ILLEGAL immigrant was killed and another seriously injured early yesterday morning when they tried to escape arrest after crossing from the occupied areas, police said.
The incident occurred at around 6.30am after police received a tip-off that a group of 50 Syrian immigrants were in the Aradippou-Avdellerou area in the Larnaca district.
Seeing the net close, two of the men broke free from the group and made a run for it across the motorway where they were hit by an oncoming car.
One of the men was killed outright, while the other was rushed to Larnaca hospital in critical condition. The driver of the car that hit them suffered a nervous breakdown and was also taken to hospital for treatment, reports said.
Speaking to reporters later in the day, Police Chief Iacovos Papacostas said: “Since this morning the arrest of a large group of illegal immigrants has been under way. Unfortunately the illegal immigrants ran on to the motorway, where one of our citizens hit two of them. One is already dead and the other is critically injured at Larnaca General Hospital.”
Papacostas said a large number of police personnel, including Rapid Reaction Unit (MMAD) officers and the police helicopter, had been mobilised to catch the immigrants.
He said the 50 had crossed over to the free areas from the north.
“From the first interrogations it seems they are all Syrian. At this moment we have caught 38 illegal immigrants,” he said.
Commenting on reporters’ observations that the majority of immigrants spoke Greek, Papacostas said this was not something he was aware of.
“If this is true then it confirms our fears and observations that the majority are people who are deported and return back to Cyprus,” he said.
He said the illegal immigrants would be deported in line with legal procedures.
A large number of police remained in the area in an effort to locate the remaining immigrants.
Cyprus has the highest concentration of illegal immigrants and asylum seekers in the EU. Its close proximity to Syria and Lebanon, about 90km in some areas, makes it vulnerable to human trafficking and illegal migration, and the legal limbo in the north makes it a haven for traffickers, who regularly channel immigrants across the ceasefire line. The vast majority of illegal immigrants transit through the north.
Police have been stepping up their efforts to stem the flow in recent months, and last November, a Syrian man was shot dead during a police operation to arrest illegal immigrants.
