Violence against Cyprus’s migrant workers trails in the wake of country's economic collapse

[dipsydoodle]

A short drive from the beach clubs of Limassol, through rows of picture-perfect orange groves, stands a rundown farm building where dirty clothes hang out to dry next to a broken tractor.

In the living room, a white toy rabbit clutching a bouquet of red roses sits on a table – an effort by the 15 Egyptian farmhands who live here to make their crowded quarters look homely.

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One night in February, a group of Cypriot youths hurled a Molotov cocktail through the window. As the flames licked across the polyester blankets, the migrant workers leapt from their bunk beds and fled. Medhat Bekhet, a 22-year-old from upper Egypt, barely noticed that he was on fire. “All the petrol got on my leg but I kept on running because I was very afraid,” he says.

The young Egyptians are here to pick fruit for €21 (£18) a day. They have work permits and are doing jobs the Cypriots do not want. But as the island faces soaring unemployment and a recession, there are fears that people are looking for someone to blame, and migrant workers prove an easy target.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/violence-against-cypruss-migrant-workers-trails-in-the-wake-of-countrys-economic-collapse-8555621.html