By Movingon93 - 1 Mar 26 11:24 PM
I have first hand experience of this. Due to travel March 2025 and I turned up and was taken into a room with multiple border control agents shouting loudly in their own language with each other.
It took a while for them to effectively say ‘we don’t allow sex offenders into Cyprus’ and I was then put in a room with a bench for several hours until I was put on a flight home.
They didn’t tell me what they knew or what paperwork they had. Fairly sure I saw a picture of myself (likely police paperwork from UK).
The police were aware of my travel. When I got back I contacted my offender manager who had confirmed they had not put any notices on my passport and had no issue with me travelling. He asked around and in the several years’ experience in his office he had never had someone turned away from Cyprus. Seems I was the first.
I’m now 5 years into my 10 year order and terrified to go abroad again. Even to Europe especially when the ETIAS is introduced.
Be careful with Cyprus if you’re currently on the register. I don’t think they have a set procedure - at times it felt like it could’ve gone either way.
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By xDanx - 2 Mar 26 6:02 PM
+xI have first hand experience of this. Due to travel March 2025 and I turned up and was taken into a room with multiple border control agents shouting loudly in their own language with each other. It took a while for them to effectively say ‘we don’t allow sex offenders into Cyprus’ and I was then put in a room with a bench for several hours until I was put on a flight home. They didn’t tell me what they knew or what paperwork they had. Fairly sure I saw a picture of myself (likely police paperwork from UK).The police were aware of my travel. When I got back I contacted my offender manager who had confirmed they had not put any notices on my passport and had no issue with me travelling. He asked around and in the several years’ experience in his office he had never had someone turned away from Cyprus. Seems I was the first. I’m now 5 years into my 10 year order and terrified to go abroad again. Even to Europe especially when the ETIAS is introduced. Be careful with Cyprus if you’re currently on the register. I don’t think they have a set procedure - at times it felt like it could’ve gone either way.
Since you are at the 5 year mark of your order, ( I am assuing it is a SHPO?)
Have you considered applying to have the order discharged?
I do not travel so I do not know fully if a discharged SHPO would help prevent instances such as this. But something worth looking into if you ever felt the need
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By AB2014 - 3 Mar 26 8:58 AM
+x+xI have first hand experience of this. Due to travel March 2025 and I turned up and was taken into a room with multiple border control agents shouting loudly in their own language with each other. It took a while for them to effectively say ‘we don’t allow sex offenders into Cyprus’ and I was then put in a room with a bench for several hours until I was put on a flight home. They didn’t tell me what they knew or what paperwork they had. Fairly sure I saw a picture of myself (likely police paperwork from UK).The police were aware of my travel. When I got back I contacted my offender manager who had confirmed they had not put any notices on my passport and had no issue with me travelling. He asked around and in the several years’ experience in his office he had never had someone turned away from Cyprus. Seems I was the first. I’m now 5 years into my 10 year order and terrified to go abroad again. Even to Europe especially when the ETIAS is introduced. Be careful with Cyprus if you’re currently on the register. I don’t think they have a set procedure - at times it felt like it could’ve gone either way. Since you are at the 5 year mark of your order, ( I am assuing it is a SHPO?) Have you considered applying to have the order discharged? I do not travel so I do not know fully if a discharged SHPO would help prevent instances such as this. But something worth looking into if you ever felt the need
Having to notify foreign travel comes from being on the Register, not the SHPO. So, if you successfully apply to have the SHPO discharged, it won't change anything technically, but it might annoy the police if they oppose the discharge and it is discharged anyway.
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By punter99 - 3 Mar 26 10:59 AM
Its not really clear how Cyprus would know about the conviction. if the ppu are saying they did not place any notices on the passport, that is suggesting there is no interpol green notice in place, but the ppu would not necessarily know, because they do not have access to the interpol database, it is a different officer within the force who handles that.
might be worth taking a day trip to france for example, to see if there are any issues there
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By AB2014 - 3 Mar 26 11:24 AM
+xIts not really clear how Cyprus would know about the conviction. if the ppu are saying they did not place any notices on the passport, that is suggesting there is no interpol green notice in place, but the ppu would not necessarily know, because they do not have access to the interpol database, it is a different officer within the force who handles that. might be worth taking a day trip to france for example, to see if there are any issues there
Any notices are requested by the National Crime Agency in consultation with the chief of police at the relevant force, so the local plod might not know. If the person had travelled before, while British nationals were still on the Schengen Information System, that information might have been kept locally after British nationals were removed from the central records.
As for travel to France, if you're not near the Channel coast, you could try a cheap Eurostar ticket from London, as the French passport control is there, not in France. Might be cheaper than a return flight.
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By CB Root - 6 Oct 25 11:20 AM
I heard from a usually reliable source that Cyprus (the EU bit) are now turning away RSOs.
Can't find anything online about it, just wondering if anyone had more info ?
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By Stersco83 - 20 Jun 26 8:11 AM
+x+xIts not really clear how Cyprus would know about the conviction. if the ppu are saying they did not place any notices on the passport, that is suggesting there is no interpol green notice in place, but the ppu would not necessarily know, because they do not have access to the interpol database, it is a different officer within the force who handles that. might be worth taking a day trip to france for example, to see if there are any issues there So from what I have recently been told, I did actually have a marker - a green diffusion notice to interpol was added when I registered for the first time. My offender manager at the time actually told me I didn’t have any notices or markers but it was removed a month after I attempted to travel to Cyprus. I assume this is how they were aware of my offending as I had never been to the country before. I also wasn’t on the register pre-brexit so no hangovers from there. I am due to head to Barcelona soon and hoping I don’t have the same issues but when I filled out my travel form it came with a notice on the front suggesting the relevant embassy be contacted to check what their policy is for admitting RSO’s. I followed the advice though I’ve been to Spain before with no issue. The embassy eventually replied saying they can’t tell me due to GDPR regulations and they don’t know the specifics of my offending so it’s left me concerned for sure. No clear guidance or reasoning - always just ‘down to local border enforcement’. Cyprus had recent images of me on some sort of official looking papers but it wasn’t anything above a green diffusion notice so I’d be very mindful of travelling there. It was a very unpleasant experience, shouted at and a lot of back and forth between officers in their language so I had no idea what was going on. Then kept in a room for hours whilst my partner waited elsewhere to be put on a flight back to a different UK airport that night. Scared of trying again in a couple of weeks to Barcelona but can’t wait another 5 years.
"green diffusion notice to interpol was added when I registered for the first time"
So years ago when you first registered, they put up a permanent memo to planet Earth? Or a brief memo which the Cyprus borderers happened to keep a record of?
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By Movingon93 - 18 Jun 26 9:41 PM
+xIts not really clear how Cyprus would know about the conviction. if the ppu are saying they did not place any notices on the passport, that is suggesting there is no interpol green notice in place, but the ppu would not necessarily know, because they do not have access to the interpol database, it is a different officer within the force who handles that. might be worth taking a day trip to france for example, to see if there are any issues there
So from what I have recently been told, I did actually have a marker - a green diffusion notice to interpol was added when I registered for the first time. My offender manager at the time actually told me I didn’t have any notices or markers but it was removed a month after I attempted to travel to Cyprus. I assume this is how they were aware of my offending as I had never been to the country before. I also wasn’t on the register pre-brexit so no hangovers from there. I am due to head to Barcelona soon and hoping I don’t have the same issues but when I filled out my travel form it came with a notice on the front suggesting the relevant embassy be contacted to check what their policy is for admitting RSO’s.
I followed the advice though I’ve been to Spain before with no issue. The embassy eventually replied saying they can’t tell me due to GDPR regulations and they don’t know the specifics of my offending so it’s left me concerned for sure. No clear guidance or reasoning - always just ‘down to local border enforcement’. Cyprus had recent images of me on some sort of official looking papers but it wasn’t anything above a green diffusion notice so I’d be very mindful of travelling there.
It was a very unpleasant experience, shouted at and a lot of back and forth between officers in their language so I had no idea what was going on. Then kept in a room for hours whilst my partner waited elsewhere to be put on a flight back to a different UK airport that night.
Scared of trying again in a couple of weeks to Barcelona but can’t wait another 5 years.
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