Civil defence sirens sounded in the Paphos district village of Kissonerga in the early hours of Saturday morning due to a malfunction.

The sirens began wailing at 12.40am, though, as civil defence spokesman Panayiotis Liassides told the Cyprus News Agency, they had only done so due to a “technical fault”.

As such, he called on local residents to “not panic”.

He added that the civil defence is now “examining good practices” from other countries with the aim of advancing the process of replacing the current system of sirens with a more modern one.

He said the system is currently being monitored and that maintenance to the area which cased Saturday’s technical malfunction has now been completed.