Cyprus riot police fired warning shots on Tuesday evening to disperse a group of about 200 migrants in the seaside town of Paphos.
At almost the same time, according to police, there were riots between residents at a shelter near the capital Nicosia.
In both cases, police officers were pelted with stones. Several people were arrested, police spokesman Christos Andreou told radio station RIK on Wednesday morning. The causes of the riots are unclear, he said.
Residents of the Chloraka neighbourhood are complaining that a kind of ghetto has formed there, housing hundreds of migrants and police have lost control, Cypriot media reported.
Cyprus has already repeatedly asked the other EU Member States to readmit migrants. In October and November of last year alone, 4,000 migrants arrived on the island, according to Interior Minister Nikos Nouris.
Relative to population, Cyprus had the highest number of asylum applications in 2020, according to EU statistics.