| Ayhan Demirci outside court |
A Turkish man has been handed a two-year prison sentence for illegally returning to north Cyprus to be with his lover.
Ayhan Demirci was deported from the north on 4 August for residing illegally, but returned 12 days later using an altered identity card belonging to his uncle.
The suspect was found guilty of ‘falsifying a document’, ‘impersonation’, and ‘entering the TRNC illegally’ at the criminal court in Kyrenia.
After the verdict, Demirci said his university student girlfriend was distraught after he was deported and that ‘she was going to commit suicide if I didn’t return, that’s why I came back’.
The judge, Pinar Beyoglu, said Demirci was caught after telling an acquaintance he returned using a false document to be with his girlfriend, which led to police arresting him.
Beyoglu said Demirci had been remanded in custody since September 6 and that the crime of ‘falsifying a document’ carried a sentence of up to 10 years.
Demirci first entered north Cyprus two years ago and worked as a blacksmith in Morphou, but became an illegal immigrant when his boss failed to get him a work visa.