Greek Cypriot police issue arrest warrant for Iranian over attempted robbery

The Greek Cypriot police have issued an arrest warrant for a 43-year-old Iranian, Emalali Esmaeil Zadeh Ghader, and three other men in connection with an attempted robbery of a jewellery shop in central Larnaca on Tuesday.

Police said they are looking to identify the three other suspects and urged the public to provide information, which may assist police with their inquiries concerning the identification and location of the suspects, to contact Larnaca CID on telephone number 24804060 or with the Citizen’s Line on telephone number 1460 or with any police station.

According to report by Greek Cypriot daily, Philenews, the suspect is known to the police in connection with a series of other robberies but has so far managed to evade arrest.

It said that he had been named in connection with a 2007 burglary of a Larnaca jewellery shop and for robberies of two bank branches in Larnaca and Limassol as part of the ‘swords gang’ in 2010.

He is suspected of being one of two men who entered a bank on Limassol’s Franklin Roosevelt avenue in October 2010. One of them threatened staff with a sword before making a getaway with 22,000 euro.

He is also suspected on being involved in a bank robbery a month later in Larnaca when two men threatened staff with a sword and a knife and fled with 12,000 euro.

The daily reported that Tuesday’s attempted robbery was stopped by the wife of the owner who managed to trigger the alarm. She was threatened with a knife and taken to hospital in shock.

The other three men sought for the crime are pictured below.