NICOSIA - Turkish Cypriot police have arrested a young man over the murder of an elderly British couple in the breakaway north of the divided island, a police spokesman said Saturday.
The 18-year-old suspect was arrested Friday, the spokesman added, without giving any other details.
The arrest came on the same day the bodies of Lyn Mahoney, 71, and his wife, Ann Maureen Mahoney, 63, were discovered stabbed to death by their cleaning lady at their home near the port city of Kyrenia.
The couple were said to have lived in the breakaway Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) for 17 years.
The motive was unclear, but initial suspicions pointed at a bungled burglary.
Several hundred Britons, mostly retirees, live in the TRNC, particularly in the Kyrenia area.
Cyprus was a British colony until it gained independence in 1960. It has been divided since 1974 after Turkey invaded in response to an Athens-inspired coup by Greek Cypriots seeking to unite the island with Greece.
03/05/2005 11:03 GMT