Police have blocked livestock farmers from marching on the Presidential Palace in Nicosia, sparking a tense standoff outside the GSP Stadium as protesters demand an immediate halt to animal culls at foot-and-mouth disease-infected units.
Farmers had planned to gather at around 10:00am near the GSP Stadium before marching to the Presidential Palace. As of 10:50am the march had not set off, with police refusing to allow farmers to bring trucks to the protest site. Tension between farmers and officers outside the stadium was reported to be running high.
The president of the organising group Voice of the Livestock Farmers, Neofytos Neofytou, told television reporters that police were doing what had been whispered about the day before. “They let us gather and now they are coming to break up the demonstration,” he said.
Speaking in heated terms, Neofytou expressed frustration that arrangements agreed in advance for the protest were not being honoured. He said the farmers had come to demonstrate peacefully and that police had arrived with shields to suppress the gathering.
The protest, organised by Voice of the Livestock Farmers, centres on demands for an immediate end to the culling of animals at infected units, with demonstrators expressing strong dissatisfaction at the way the authorities have handled the crisis.
The outbreak has spread to around 120 livestock units across the island since it was first detected in February, with approximately 71,000 animals culled across multiple districts. Under EU rules, if even one animal in a unit tests positive the entire herd must be slaughtered — a policy Agriculture Minister Maria Panayiotou has said is non-negotiable under EU law.
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