A crew of reporters who had travelled to Pachna to cover the protest of farmers reportedly got attacked by members of the newly formed association of livestock farmers ‘The Voice of Livestock Breeders’ on Thursday.

The farmers had staged a protest in Pachna to prevent the culling of further animals amid the most recent outbreak of the foot and mouth disease in the area.

“[We] will stand up to the killings,” said president of the association, Neophytos Neophytou in an interview with Sigma.

He alleged that the farmers were left without answers and said that the question of what would happen if the new animals they were raising became infected with the virus remained unanswered.

“The virus exists and will not go away. We simply destroyed our animals. We have almost fewer animals in the free areas than in the occupied ones,” he added.

According to local media reports, the owner of the unit expressed his doubts over the diagnosis of his animals, saying they did not display any symptoms of the disease and requested that only the animals that have been tested positive be killed.

Moreover, he said that his animals were not moved outside his farm,  raising questions about how the animals were infected in the first place.