Athens: Two Pakistani men have been jailed for life in Greece for gang-raping an 18-year-old British girl on her sunbed after she went for a morning swim. The two men, aged 27 and 24, raped the Briton on a beach in Rethymno, a city on the north coast of Crete, in July 2022.
The Pakistanis, who have not been named, had approached the then 18-year-old as she sunbathed on a sunbed before launching their attack. The young tourist tearfully told Rethymno court how the two men pinned her down on the sunbed and raped her one after the other, reports the Olympia newspaper.
The woman had immediately reported the gang-rape to the authorities before the police were able to identify and arrest her attackers. The two men confessed to the crime at the time of their arrest, but during their court appearance, they claimed that the woman had consented and had stopped when she asked them to.
But the court sentenced the two Pakistanis to life in prison over the gang-rape. They will serve their sentence in prisons in the Greek city of Tripoli. Their lawyers have appealed the sentence, according to local media.
The sentencing comes days after two 19-year-old British men accused of raping a British woman and filming the attack in a Greek hotel were released from custody but ordered to report to the embassy in London every month while the investigation continues.
The 24-year-old unidentified Briton claimed the two teenagers assaulted her in her inebriated state in a hotel room last week in Rethymno on the Greek island of Crete. She alleged the pair filmed the sexual assault on their mobile phones after meeting them at a bar in the city earlier that night.
The woman said the three consumed alcohol and went back to the hotel where the two men were staying. She said she woke up naked the next morning and did not know where she was. Both men were arrested and appeared in court where they were released with restrictive conditions and fined.