Cyprus: UK woman faces rape claim sentencing, with Israeli supporters on hand

A Cypriot court was due Tuesday to sentence a British woman convicted of falsely accusing a group of 12 Israelis of gang rape, in a case that has stirred passions in the three countries.

The 19-year-old was found guilty last week of “public mischief” and could face up to a year in jail along with a fine.

Her defense team have accused Cypriot authorities of a litany of rights failings, and are to lodge an appeal in the island’s supreme court. Meanwhile, Britain’s Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has said he has “firmly and categorically registered” concerns with Cypriot officials.

British and Cypriot media outlets reported Monday that the woman will receive a presidential pardon if she is sentenced to prison.

Over 50 Israelis have flown to Cyprus to stand by the British woman.

“The minimum we can do is to be there to offer support, to show her that we believe her,” said Orit Sulitzeanu, executive director of the Association of Rape Crisis Centers in Israel, adding that the protest was partly out of disgust that the “boys returned to Israel as heroes.”

They demonstrated outside the Cypriot courthouse alongside local activists.

On Monday, the mother of the British woman met with the Israelis, the Kan public broadcaster reported, telling the group that their support was particularly important.

“I can’t believe the amount of support we have seen from around the world. In particular this group of people really changed perceptions back in the UK. I’ve got friends and family who are all messaging about it and it is fantastic,” the mother of the woman said.

Lawyers for the woman say she was raped in the seaside resort of Ayia Napa by the Israeli teenagers in their hotel room on July 17.

She fled in distress to her own hotel and was examined by an in-house doctor, who called the police.

A group of Israeli teenagers were arrested and appeared in court, but 10 days after making a complaint of rape the woman was interviewed again by police and signed a retraction.

The Israelis, who ranged in age from 15 to 18, were allowed to return to Israel and not called as witnesses.

Possible pardon

On Monday, the Cypriot newspaper Phileleftheros reported that the country’s president, Nicos Anastasiades, is waiting to see the outcome of her sentencing, at the Famagusta District Court in Paralimni, before announcing his decision on a possible pardon.

“Should the court move to order her to prison, the president has already decided that he will pardon the girl, immediately after the ruling,” the Daily Mail reported, citing the Cypriot newspaper.

Cypriot government sources told Phileleftheros the president did not make his decision due to pressure from the British government, but rather due to the woman’s age and the furor the case has caused in Cyprus and abroad.

The sources said the president did not involve himself in proceedings until now because he did not want to give the impression that the Nicosia government was interfering with the country’s judicial system.

Britain’s Foreign Office has said it is “seriously concerned” about whether the woman received a fair trial, and the case has been taken up by rape survivors and rights groups, including in Israel.

The woman, who has not been named, would accept a pardon from the president if it is offered, her mother told a British morning television show Monday.

“Of course, in the event she was put into prison, to get out of prison, she would accept a pardon,” the mother said, according to The Sun newspaper. “Provided that would be subject to her not admitting guilt. She is innocent. She was brutally and violently raped by a group of men.”

She said her daughter is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder and hallucinations due to the trauma she has suffered from the case. That account was backed up by the report of a psychologist who evaluated the woman after the alleged rape and said her state of mind when she recanted the accusation was not properly taken into consideration during her trial.

After their release without charge, the accused Israelis received a heroes’ welcome when they arrived back in Israel. The Israelis have not denied they had sexual relations with the woman, but claim it was consensual.

The tourist was convicted in Cyprus last week, with Famagusta District Court Judge Michalis Papathanasiou saying she had not told the truth and had tried to deceive the court with “evasive” statements in her testimony.

The judge said the woman had admitted to investigators that she made up the claims because she was “ashamed” after finding out that some of the Israelis had taken cellphone video of her having consensual sex. Police have reportedly claimed the content of the video contradicts the woman’s initial rape claims.

Later, the woman claimed police had pressured her into withdrawing her complaint and a linguistics expert witness who testified at the trial said the grammar of her retraction did not appear to be that of a native English-speaker and was likely dictated to her.

During the trial, defense lawyers called the police investigation deficient and improper, alleging detectives had made major lapses and omissions in their work while having a mistaken perception of the facts surrounding their client’s claim.

Her Cypriot counsel, Nicoletta Charalambidou, told AFP that the woman had been called in on July 27 by a policewoman who had taken her initial complaint.

Male police officers “picked her up, locking the doors of the car.”

She was then interrogated from early evening until the early hours of the next morning, when she signed the retraction.

The process was carried out in the absence of a translator or lawyer acting on her behalf, according to her legal team.

Police called in a female “welfare officer, who was there for some time… but the girl said she was not there during the retraction,” Charalambidou said.

The woman has been unable to leave the Mediterranean island since the case began.

Last week, the young woman urged UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson to intervene and bring her home, according to The Sun. “I am 19 and all I want to do is clear my name and come home to my family,” she was quoted as saying by the daily. “Time is running out for me. Please, please help.”

On Monday, some 60 people, most of them women, demonstrated in London to call on the government to help the British woman.