Six ‘thugs’ held over ‘revenge’ beating

POLICE arrested six people after a group of thugs attacked a man in broad daylight in the centre of Lefkoşa last Sunday.

The incident, which was caught on CCTV, happened at around 5pm on Girne Caddesi, the main road in the capital’s walled city.

Shocking footage shared online showed the victim, named by police as William Antony Peters, being viciously set upon by a group of men from behind while he was standing outside a shop.

The video of the attack shows a female wearing a short skirt and crop top appearing to talk to Peters and distract him.

A male then runs up and attacks Peters from behind, before several other male assailants join in, punching and kicking their victim and hitting him with sticks as the female casually walks away. The attack lasts for nearly a minute before onlookers cautiously intervene.

A statement from the police issued on Tuesday said that a “group of youths” gathered “illegally” and “severely beat” Peters “on the grounds that he had caused their friend to be injured in a road traffic accident”, believed to be a reference to Ozan Polat, a 19-year-old taxi driver who was seriously injured after being hit by a car in Gönyeli three days earlier. The statement added that the investigation into the incident is ongoing.

Meanwhile a social media post on Monday by the “Voice of Liberians In Cyprus-VOLIC TV” that was shared by the Liberian Students’ Association in Northern Cyprus said that Peters was a student from Liberia and enrolled at the Rauf Denktaş University in Lefkoşa.

The post added that the victim was “severely brutalised” and was receiving treatment for his injuries in hospital.