{"id":727163,"date":"2026-08-04T12:04:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T12:04:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/727163\/"},"modified":"2026-08-04T12:04:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T12:04:08","slug":"afghan-boxer-26-arrested-in-connection-with-death-of-scottish-woman-in-greece","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/727163\/","title":{"rendered":"Afghan boxer, 26, arrested in connection with death of Scottish woman in Greece"},"content":{"rendered":"

The man suspected of killing Scottish aid worker Elisabeth Jane Ross in Greece is 26-year-old Sharif Ahmadzai, the BBC understands.<\/p>\n

He was arrested after the body of the 38-year-old was found in a suitcase in an abandoned building in the Kypseli district of Athens on 18 July, several days after she was reported missing.<\/p>\n

Ahmadzai, who was born in Afghanistan and is a champion boxer, travelled to Greece as a refugee.<\/p>\n

He is expected to appear in court in Athens on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

The BBC understands Ahmadzai, who left Afghanistan after being orphaned aged 15, lives in Greece with his American wife and child.<\/p>\n

His father, a commander in the Afghan army, was shot dead and his mother and siblings were killed by a suicide bomber in Kabul.<\/p>\n

He travelled to Greece via Iran and Turkey, according to a video telling his story, external<\/a> which was published by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), before settling in a refugee camp on the island of Lesbos.<\/p>\n

It is understood this is where he met his wife and converted to Christianity. The pair then set up the charity Love Every Nation Athens to help other refugees.<\/p>\n

It is thought that he met Ross through the charity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The man suspected of killing Scottish aid worker Elisabeth Jane Ross in Greece is 26-year-old Sharif Ahmadzai, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":727164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-727163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=727163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/727163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/727164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=727163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=727163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=727163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}