UK tourist shot dead on Caribbean island

MASKED gunmen have shot dead a 71-year-old British holidaymaker in a robbery on the tourist paradise of Turks and Caicos, police said.

The victim had been visiting a friend in the British territory, 150 miles (200km) north of Haiti, when two assailants burst into the home at about 11pm local time on Tuesday.

They demanded money, but it was not immediately clear how the situation escalated before the gunmen made off with an undisclosed amount of cash, a ring and a watch, a police spokesman said.

The friend was treated for non-lifethreatening injuries at a private residence in Cooper Jack on the tiny island’s south coast.

It is the second murder in three days in the archipelago, home to 35,000 people. The homicide toll was already at 10 this year, Police Commissioner Trevor Botting said in a statement.

A shooting at a nightclub in Providenciales on Saturday left one man dead and a second wounded. “This spike in gun crime simply has to change,” Mr Botting said. “No one should be happy with how gun crimes are increasing in the Turks and Caicos Islands.”

Earlier this year the US State Department warned tourists to “exercise increased caution” when visiting.