A 43-year-old man was remanded in custody for eight days by the Limassol district court on Sunday after admitting he killed 61-year-old Olga Vasilyeva with repeated hammer blows to the head.

The suspect appeared without a lawyer, telling the court he did not wish to be represented. He had been represented at the first hearing on Saturday.

Police told the court the man had given a voluntary statement confessing to the killing.

He said he was at his home with Vasilyeva when she insulted him, and that, in an apparent fit of rage, struck her on the head with a hammer.

According to the police account, he left her body at the house overnight. The next day he returned, parked his vehicle and drove towards Moniatis. He then placed the corpse down a manhole in a remote field.

Officers from the Limassol CID found the body on Saturday night in the Saittas area of mountainous Limassol.

A forensic pathologist attended the scene to establish the exact cause of death.

Initial examinations found multiple injuries to the front and back of the head, caused by a blunt object.

Police believe the body was moved during the first days after the killing.

The suspect told police he threw the hammer over a pergola at his home, which has not yet been recovered, and officers are due to search for it today.

Vasilyeva had been missing since 23 October., with her disappearance was reported to police on 28 October, and authorities first investigated the case as an abduction with intent to commit premeditated murder.

The suspect was arrested at Larnaca airport as he tried to leave Cyprus. He was first held under a six-day detention order, and during that time he admitted responsibility under questioning.

He was rearrested on suspicion of premeditated murder. Police said further investigations were needed to establish all the circumstances of the killing, which is being treated as a femicide.