Arriving back in Cyprus on Sunday night, President Nikos Christodoulides fired the police chief and the deputy director of prisons.
The move follows the escape last week – and subsequent arrest earlier on Sunday – of man convicted of murdering his partner and her daughter.
In a post on X, government spokesman Konstantinos Letymbiotis said Christodoulides had exercised his constitutional right to dismiss police chief Stelios Papatheodorou and gave instructions to the justice minister to do the same for acting director of prisons Charalmbos Philippides.
At the same time, Christodoulides named Themistos Arnaoutis as the chief of police and Panicos Stavrou as his deputy.
And, in cooperation with the justice minister, he said he will proceed to call a meeting of the Public Service Commission to appoint Constantinos Constantinides to the position of deputy of prisons.
The move follows the escape on Thursday of Doros Theofanous when he was under the guard of four prison officers and three special police unit officers on a scheduled trip from the central prison to his family home.
Christodoulides had been in New York where he addressed the UN general assembly.
