Oxi Day celebrated with parades

Oxi Day was celebrated on Saturday morning with a parade through the streets of Cyprus’ towns and cities.

Schoolchildren, soldiers and others in traditional Greek dress walked to the sound of marching music as crowds of onlookers lined the parades’ routes.

Before the parades began, President Nikos Christodoulides attended a service at the Saint Barnabas cathedral in Nicosia.

Elsewhere, government ministers travelled to all corners of the island to attend parades and church services. Justice Minister Anna Procopiou visited Polis Chrysochous, while Agriculture Minister Petros Xenophontos was in Aradippou.

Oxi Day is commemorated on October 28 every year. It falls on the anniversary of Greek Prime Minister Ioannis Metaxas’ rejection of an ultimatum made to him by Italian dictator Benito Mussolini to allow Axis forces to enter Greece in 1940.

It became a public holiday in both Greece and Cyprus after the end of the Second World War.