FIVE YOUTHS, including a serving officer of the National Guard, were arrested yesterday in connection with an attack on students voting at the University of Nicosia on Tuesday late afternoon.
A group of around 15 black-clad assailants wearing helmets and wielding bats and crowbars stormed the hall where student elections were taking place at the university at around 5.30pm on Tuesday.
One helmet-wearing intruder used pepper spray on students, others threw chairs around while their collaborators stole four of the ten ballot boxes in the hall. Five people went to hospital for treatment after inhaling the spray.
According to police spokesman Michalis Katsounotos, the assailants entered and left the hall in formation.
The students were in the process of electing representatives to the various departments of the university.
The incident was widely condemned yesterday by the government, political parties and student bodies.
Katsounotos announced yesterday that in the early hours of yesterday morning, police arrested a 26-year-old army officer in Larnaca, noting that “important” evidence was found during a search of his house.
Sigmalive.com yesterday reported that leaflets belonging to a number of far-right organisations were found in the house.
The officer was later remanded in custody for eight days by the Nicosia district court. Throughout the day, police also arrested a 23 and 21-year-old from Nicosia and a 22-year-old from Limassol. A fifth person, from Dasaki tis Achnas, was arrested last night with the help of the British Bases police in Dhekelia.
The four are being questioned in connection with charges of conspiracy to commit a felony and misdemeanor, illegal entry, assault causing actual bodily harm, use of pepper spray, carrying a weapon to exercise terror and other related offences.
“The 26-year-old who was remanded for eight days has troubled us before in an incident outside the presidential palace on July 13, 2011, during protests related to the tragic events at Mari. While the 21-year-old has troubled us before with incidents outside the central prisons on April 1,” said Katsounotos.
The police spokesman said four more arrest warrants had been issued for this “unprecedented, unacceptable and reprehensible incident”.
Government spokesman Stefanos Stefanou described the attack on the student election process “unprecedented, unacceptable and dangerous”. He said it was the duty of all “to stand decisively without hesitation against such extreme fascist actions which bring to mind painful and traumatic experiences of the recent past”.
The University of Nicosia released a statement denouncing the attack, highlighting that it had a “zero tolerance policy on intolerant behaviour”.
Speaking to the state broadcaster, university dean Nicos Peristianis said the perpetrators “used spray to cause confusion, took the ballot boxes and left. It happened so fast that it was difficult for the students or anyone else to react.”
“The indications are that this has to do with a specific far-right ideology which adopts violence as a method of political action, racist slogans and an ideology in general which is unacceptable,” he added.
The private university is proceeding with additional security measures at its facilities and will launch an investigation into the presence of fascistic ideology within the student population.
All parties yesterday released statements condemning the attack.
Nationalist party ELAM (National Popular Front) also condemned the student attack as well as the “orchestrated effort to smear the name and create negative impressions against ELAM from a reprehensible event”, saying these efforts have become a daily occurrence.
