Betting shop robber caught within hours

POLICE arrested a 30-year-old Syrian man just hours after he robbed a Paphos betting shop employee at knifepoint.

The shop is close to the technical school in Paphos. The man, whose wife is Cypriot, forced the 23-year-old employee to hand over €870 after punching her and dragging her to the cash till. The Syrian man was not wearing a mask, and was wearing an easily identifiable coat. He snatched the money and ran. The betting shop employee was able to identify the robber and to give further details to police, as he had previously been a regular customer. Police found the stolen cash, the knife and the coat worn in the burglary at the Syrians’ home.

Meanwhile, at around 4am yesterday, a man, thought to be a foreign national, threatened a kiosk attendant at Paphos’ Leoforos Apostolos Pavlou, demanding she empty the till and hand over the takings. The woman panicked and started to scream hysterically. As a result, the would-be robber ran away empty handed.

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.