LGBT rights organisation Accept LGBTI called on police on Friday to investigate the vandalism of banners promoting the Queer Wave film festival in Kaimakli.

Organisers said the banners were torn down on Wednesday night in what they described as an attack on queer visibility in public space.

In a social media post, Accept said the act went beyond mere damage to physical material, arguing it targeted the right of any organiser to promote an event and the right of a community to declare its presence publicly.

“Vandalism is not an opinion,” the organisation stressed, adding that anyone opposed to the festival was “free to say so openly” rather than remove the banners “under cover of darkness”.

Accept said the incident drew attention to the fact on whether public space in Cyprus is “truly open to all”, and called on the Nicosia municipality and the Kaimakli community to state publicly that “the neighbourhood belongs to everyone who lives there”.

The organisation referred to protections for freedom of expression and assembly, arguing these apply to “all members of the public rather than only the majority”, and that the state carries a duty to actively protect such rights rather than “simply tolerate them”.

It called on police to treat the case with the seriousness due an act directed at a group because of its identity.

Accept said it stood by Queer Wave and others producing cultural events under “intimidating” conditions.