Five Israeli men were acquitted of all charges at a Cyprus court over the alleged gang rape of a 20-year-old British woman.
The males, all aged between 19 and 20, and from the Israeli-Arab town of Majd al-Krum, had been remanded in custody since the alleged incident in the resort of Ayia Napa on 3 September 2023.
But on Monday a three-member district court in Paralimni dismissed the charges after deciding the20-year-old’s account had “lacked coherence and contained numerous substantial contradictions”.
The court ruled her statement where she claimed she was dragged from a party of 100 people was not convincing, as a friend testified seeing her simply go upstairs to a room with another person.
While lab tests showed the woman had consumed significant amounts of alcohol and was also under the influence of narcotics (MDA and MDMA), the court ruled this was not to a degree that would deprive her of the ability to consent to sex – since she herself said she felt only “slightly dizzy” at the time.
Their lawyer Nir Yaslovitzh told Israel’s Channel 12: “It is a brave decision that completely rejected the complainant’s version and completely accepts our clients’ version.”
But the British woman’s lawyer strongly criticised the decision, which has also attracted criticism from women’s groups.
Michael Polak told the Guardian newspaper:” The young lady in this case is gay, any suggestion that she voluntarily agreed to group sex with men she had never met before, who were speaking in a different language, is ridiculous.
“She has been left completely distraught by the court’s verdict today. It was one of the hardest phone calls I have ever had to make.”
Polak, from the UK based Justice Abroad organisation, added:”“Recently, the European court of human rights ruled that there is no effective protection for women subject to sexual offences in the Republic of Cyprus.”
