Police in Cyprus found a body in a lake on Sunday that they believe to be the fifth victim of a suspected serial killer who preyed on foreign women for almost three years without detection.
Divers retrieved the body from a lake west of the capital Nicosia, the same location where a woman was found dead in a submerged suitcase a week ago.
The latest body was also in a suitcase.
The Cyprus News Agency reported that their information suggested it was that the body was fully clothed and was likely that of a child.
Nicos Metaxas, a35-year-old career army captain has been in custody since late April on suspicion of killing five adult women and the young daughters of two of the victims.
Four of those killed are thought to be from the Philippines, including a mother and her six-year-old daughter. A woman from Romania and her eight-year-old daughter and a further victim from Nepal were also killed.
Police say they have two written confessions from the suspect, who met the women online. Most were employed as housekeepers on the island, and disappeared between September 2016 and July to August 2018.
The case has triggered outrage and horror in Cyprus, where the cases appear to be the worst peacetime atrocities against women in living memory.
On Friday Cyprus’s president fired the chief of police and a day earlier the justice minister resigned.
Authorities using sonar to scan a man-made lake in the bowl of an abandoned copper mine discovered the body on Sunday afternoon.
Hours earlier, the suspect was taken before a local magistrate who extended his period of remand pending the completion of inquiries.
Via Reuters / The Cyprus Mail
