Police headquarters have confirmed the authenticity of a viral video showing police officers engaging in sexual intercourse in broad daylight in a patrol car.

Those involved have also been identified and have been suspended. One is said to have been off duty at the time. The other was not.

The police have ordered criminal and disciplinary investigations. Criminal charges could include neglect of duty and performing an indecent act in public.

“Such actions and behaviours are unacceptable as they insult the work of thousands of our members,” the police said.

The video was captured by a Larnaca resident and it went viral on social media, exposing the force, as it shows two police officers, reportedly a man and a woman, in sexual acts in their patrol car, which they parked in an open space.

From the video it appears that the officers were unperturbed by the fact that they were in public view in broad daylight.

Comments on social media are ridiculing the force amid at a time when police HQ and Justice Minister Marios Hartsiotis are on alert monitoring the explosive situation and exchange of missiles in the nearby Middle East.

Although the pair were unidentifiable to the public in the video, reports said police are trying to track down the person who filmed the public tryst said the investigation and to examine whether there had been a violation of personal data.

Amid the widespread mockery, police spokesperson Kyriaki Lambrianidou also called for some sensitivity as children and families are involved.

The person who filmed could have handed the video over to police rather than post it online for public consumption, she told the Cyprus News Agency.

Lambrianidou said the investigations have been undertaken by the directorate of professional standards and inspection.