Increasing number of asylum seekers using fake documents to leave Cyprus for Europe

Source: Schengen Visa Info

The number of people attempting to leave the territory of Cyprus by using fake documents has been increasing in the last few months.

The Cypriot authorities have announced that in the first eight months of 2022, from January until the end of August, a total of 278 people tried to leave the country by using the travel documents of others, SchengenVisaInfo.com reports.

The authorities explained these individuals were arrested as soon as the authorities found out that the travel documents did not belong to them. It has been revealed that 144 of these individuals were arrested at Larnaca International Airport, and another 134 of them were arrested at Paphos International Airport.

A spokesperson of the Cypriot police said that these individuals presented genuine passports or identity cards issued by other European Union countries that belonged to other persons when they tried to leave Cyprus.

Sharing the data, the police explained that the authorities at the airport were able to detect these people by only looking at the passport picture, which was different from the person that was holding it.

According to the authorities, the majority of people who have been arrested for attempting to leave the country by using someone else’s travel document are asylum seekers from Congo and Nigeria.

In addition, it was revealed that most of these persons aim to reach Germany, France, Belgium as well as Italy.

Taking into account the high number of people that tried to leave Cyprus illegally, the police spokesperson said that the police officers who are responsible for checking the travel documents at the two above-mentioned airports would receive training that will help them to recognize similar behaviors in the future.

Previously, SchengenVisaInfo.com reported that four people were arrested in Cyprus as they tried to travel under false pretenses. The Paphos court detained these four individuals for five days. Two of them were suspected of using travel documents of other individuals and the other two of helping them to leave the country.

The police said that these four people appeared together at the Paphos airport on September 3 and claimed to be a family traveling to another EU country.

However, during the passport control, the police found out that even though the passports were original, they did not belong to them as they looked different from the passport picture.

Except for Cyprus, other EU countries have also reported similar cases. Just recently, the Greek authorities detained 22 migrants who were trying to leave Crete with fake travel documents.