Change the name from TRNC to the hitman’s paradise of northern Cyprus’: TRNC opposition MP

Turkish Cypriot opposition political party CTP ‘MP’ Sami Ozuslu on Tuesday night suggested that the government of northern Cyprus renamed the country as the “hitman’s paradise of northern Cyprus”, in response to the arrest of a fourth contracted hitman sent to north Cyprus in the space of nine months.

“If you have the authority, I would like to request that we change the name of the TRNC to the ‘hitman’s paradise of northern Cyprus’, let it be on the records,” he told TRNC’s ‘parliament’.

“This is the situation we are currently experiencing.”

In Turkish, the acronym “KKTC”, for “TRNC”, is unchanged if “Turkish republic” is exchanged for “hitman’s paradise”.

Ozuslu went on to argue that there is “no security of life or property in the country”, given the relative frequency of hitmen being arrested, with his statements drawing the ire of ‘health minister’ Hakan Dincyurek.

Dincyurek accused him of “insulting this country’s name, this state’s name”.

“You are in this country’s republican assembly, you. The office you represent is that of a member of parliament of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. You come here and discredit an institution which you do not respect and in which you do not believe. No one accepts this; I also do not accept this. I condemn you with all my heart. Come and apologise,” he said.

The latest incident of the alleged contracting of a hitman in north Cyprus occurred on Sunday, with a Turkish national firing shots at a parked car in the Kyrenia district village of Çatalköy just hours after arriving in the country for the first time.

No one was harmed in the incident, and the man was arrested after escaping the scene in the back of a taxi. The police later found a Glock-branded gun, two socks and a T-shirt on a stream bed onto which the man said he had thrown the items.

In court on Monday, prosecution lawyer Ali Hidayet was keen to point out that the incident was the fourth of its kind to have taken place in north Cyprus since last summer.

The man said he regretted his actions, and was remanded in custody for three days, with his next hearing set to take place on Thursday.

Cyprus Mail