The number of prosecuted cases represents the number of cases filed with the courts.
The numbers presented here include hate speech offences, which fall outside the OSCE definition of hate crime but could not be disaggregated.
In the breakdown below, more than one motivation and more than one criminal offence can be recorded for a single incident; therefore, the total number below exceeds that of the recorded incidents presented above. The data below may also include incidents of hate speech, which fall outside the OSCE definition of hate crime
The Cyprus Police has appointed two officers from each District Department with experience in investigative duties to act as liaison officers with the Legal Department and the Human Rights and Combating Discrimination Office of the Police. In total, there are 12 liaison officers responsible for co-ordinating and supervising the investigation of complaints concerning incidents or cases of discrimination, racism and/or racist motives or other related hate crimes. The liaison officers also ensure that the Police's Human Rights and Combating Discrimination Office is immediately informed about incidents or offences related to discrimination, while also working with relevant civil servants and civil society organizations to report and record racist incidents and support victims of such crimes, among other measures.
The Cyprus Police has developed a form to record incidents with a racist motive or other related hate offences. The form must be completed by the officer receiving the complaint, and then sent to the Liaison Officer of the District Department responsible for monitoring anti-discrimination issues in the District. The form is subsequently forwarded to the Human Rights and Combating Discrimination Office for statistical purposes.
Police Standing Order No. 3/38, 'Management of Offences and Anti-Discrimination Issues', was revised in October 2023 to include bias indicators and provisions for the protection of victims. In particular, when handling hate crime cases, police officers are required to:
(a) recognize and treat the victim with respect, sensitivity, and an individualized, professional and non-discriminatory approach;
(b) ensure that victims can exercise their rights without discrimination on any grounds, including sex, race, colour, language, disability, religion, sexual orientation, political or other opinion, national or social origin, membership of an ethnic minority, birth or any other status of the victim;
(c) inform victims of their rights; and
(d) take into account the needs of victims.
The Cyprus Police has prepared a handbook entitled "Human Rights Handbook", which includes a separate chapter on combating racism, xenophobia and intolerance. The purpose of the manual is to inform and raise awareness among members of the police about human rights. The manual is uploaded on the internal portal of the police and was designed, printed and disseminated in 2022.
This category consists of crimes motivated by bias based on nationality and ethnic origin (namely, three anti-African, eight anti-Arab, five anti-Asian, three anti-European and 16 unspecified), as well as one crime based on bias against the Turkish-Cypriot community and six motivated by bias based on skin colour.
Crimes reported in this category were motivated by a bias based on sexual orientation.
ODIHR recognizes the efforts of Cyprus to improve their police hate crime recording methodology and to ensure the sensitive treatment of hate crime victims. However, based on the available information, it observes that Cyprus' hate crime recording and statistics do not sufficiently distinguish hate crimes from other crimes. In addition, ODIHR observes that Cyprus would benefit from raising awareness among and building the capacity of criminal justice officials to address hate crime.
ODIHR recalls that in Ministerial Council Decision 9/09, OSCE participating States committed to periodically reporting reliable information and statistics on hate crimes to ODIHR. Participating States also committed to introducing or further developing professional training and capacity-building activities for law enforcement, prosecution and judicial officials dealing with hate crimes. ODIHR stands ready to support Cyprus in meeting its relevant commitments through the provision of comprehensive resources and tailored assistance in the area of hate crime recording and data collection, as well as by providing further resources and capacity-building assistance for its police, prosecutors, and the judiciary.
🛈 Please note that the data in the charts above are based on voluntary civil society submissions and as such might not be representative of the actual number of incidents affecting individual communities.
🛈 Please note that the total number of incidents may be lower than the sum of incidents presented in the breakdown chart above, as some incidents involve multiple bias motivations.
🛈 ODIHR no longer presents descriptions of property attacks in the incident tables below. Data on property attacks are presented in the breakdown charts above. One property attack may target multiple properties or involve multiple types of attack.