Trouble under the sun - but this time, the Army takes a real beating

Dozens of soldiers and police were hurt when an RAF base in Cyprus was attacked by demonstrators angry over the arrest of an MP

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At first light, with the whiff of tear gas still lingering, they began clearing the broken glass and burnt-out cars at RAF Akrotiri, and patching up the walking wounded at the nearby Episkopi base.

In London, the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, declared the mayhem was "completely unacceptable". He was not, of course, the first minister of the Crown to be concerned about serious trouble in Cyprus. The Mediterranean island has for a long time become synonymous with violence ­ brawls, stabbings, rape and murder ­ involving British forces.

The forces say they have cleaned up their act. And, indeed, Tuesday night's eruption was a bit more than servicemen behaving badly. The detention of a Cypriot MP and his rescue attempt by 1,000 enraged Cypriots, injuring 43 soldiers and policemen and causing £300,000 of damage, is a sign of an increasingly strident antipathy to the British presence.

The MP, Marios Matsakis, has been a vociferous critic of foreign military bases on his island 40 years after independence. He and his supporters have, in the past, protested about soldiers using as target practice a monument to a local man killed by a grenade. This time Mr Matsakis climbed a new 300ft communications mast at Akrotiri to plant a Cypriot flag. He and many of his constituents claim the mast presents a cancer risk.

Mr Matsakis's arrest was followed by five hours of rioting. Gangs of youths, many of them drunk, some of them masked, charged into the RAF compound, showering the security forces, in riot gear, with paving stones, bricks and fire-bombs.

Twenty-two vehicles were set alight. Some of them were military Range Rovers, but Cypriot vehicles, too, were torched and a number of tourist cars attacked. Four terrified holidaymakers had to be rescued by military policemen.

The police countered with water cannon and tear gas as helicopters pinpointed the ringleaders with spotlights.

"Our policemen received a real beating," said Brigadier David Ratcliffe, administrator of the British sovereign bases on the island, surveying the destruction yesterday. Indeed, the ferocity of Tuesday's rioting shocked many Cypriots as well.

Mr Matsakis, however, was relishing the role of the modest hero who has taken on the big battalions and won. He was also keen to predict calamities. "These satanic antennae will kill children," he announced. "I have done my duty and have no regrets."

The official position of the Greek Cypriot government is to support the British line that the cancer fears are unfounded. However, the Foreign Minister Yiannakis Cassoulides could see which way his countrymen's opinion was blowing, and criticised London for starting construction before "consultation with the Cypriot government had been completed".

An exasperated Mr Straw insisted: "The Cypriot government has been fully consulted. A huge amount of effort has gone in to consult the local people and to satisfy them that these transmissions are safe."

Tuesday night's violence only abated after Mr Matsakis, who had claimed parliamentary privilege while in custody, was released to the crowd. His actions were not prompted by anti-British bias, he stressed. After all he had spent eight years in the Territorial Army while living in England.

But he was eager to point out that he has first-hand experience of the brutality which has periodically exploded from British servicemen on the island. Six years ago, as a forensic pathologist, he helped investigate the murder of Louise Jensen, a Danish tour guide killed by three riflemen from the Royal Green Jackets.

The murder became a highly emotive symbol of how badly things had gone wrong in the British forces. Ms Jensen was on her way home riding pillion on her Cypriot boyfriend's motorcycle, when they were both knocked down. The boyfriend was beaten up and she was bludgeoned with a spade after drunken attempts to rape her.

The three soldiers were tried, convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. But the case focused attention on the culture of binge drinking and casual violence among the personnel serving in the island.

There have been a series of other incidents. Two English tourists, Barry Ford and Shane Bell, were viciously assaulted by soldiers from the King's Regiment; a group of Royal Marines were fined for running around drunk and naked; three soldiers from the Royal Signals were fined for indecent exposure. Each episode received extensive media coverage in Cyprus, fuelling resentment at the British. Mr Matsakis and his supporters claim the protest was, at least partly, a result of that resentment.

Cyprus is Britain's most important base overseas and a prized posting compared to Sierra Leone, Kosovo or Northern Ireland. There is no living rough or malaria, no hostile RUF, KLA or IRA. Apart from periodic exercises, work is mostly restricted to mornings with afternoons and nights free.

Many of the soldiers take advantage of the opportunities offered to go swimming, sailing, and scuba-diving. But for others the drinking would begin at midday and extend past midnight in the bars of Ayia Napa. The resort is well known for drinking, casual sex, and fights between squaddies and locals.

The Ministry of Defence clamped down after the bad publicity, and service personnel were ordered to stay away from the centre of Ayia Napa and its bars. The latest violence, say the Army, has been orchestrated by unscrupulous politicians.

Captain Rupert Greenwood, of the Queens Royal Hussars, said yesterday: "What happened was appalling. There may have been problems at Ayia Napa in the past, but that is certainly not the case now. What we have is some people preying on fears of the locals over this mast. It is cynical, destructive and totally unjustified."