A man was arrested after taking a total of €2,000 on the promise that he would help illegally transport migrants from the Republic to the north.

He was summoned by the Turkish Cypriot police to the Trachoni police station on Friday, where he said he had received the money, but had been unable to take anyone to the north due to “bad events and some difficulties”.

Asked to elaborate, he said one of the people he was supposed to transport to the north had been involved in a road traffic accident.

In court in northern Nicosia on Monday, he was released on a 30,000TL (€798) bail after two guarantors signed bonds worth 300,000TL (€7,976) each.

He was also banned from leaving the north until his trial begins and has been ordered to present himself to the Turkish Cypriot police once a week.

The man’s arrest comes amid an increasing number of cases of people illegally crossing the Green Line to enter the north from the Republic, with many of those arrested being of Syrian origin.

Last Wednesday, a Syrian national who had illegally crossed to the north having lived in the Republic for four years was sent to prison for a month pending a trial, while a family of four, including an eight-month pregnant woman and a one-year-old child, were arrested near the Ledra Palace hotel in the buffer zone on August 25.