| travelerjan |
Dec 1st, 2010 08:09 AM |
That's good news, that Paris has followed the Lead of Athens in combating a crime that targets tourists.
Greece has always had a lower crime rate than the rest of Europe, so it was dismaying when about 4 years ago, pickpocketing became big news, mainly on one line of the Metro at at a couple of usually-crowded landmark Athens sites, such as "changing of the Guard" at the Syntagma Square, in front of the Parliament. The Metro line that was plagued was the one coming from the Port, which is packed with tourists coming from ferries or cruise ships.
Therefore it was major and welcomed news in late May 2010 when Greek police succeeded in rounding up a 70-person pickpocketing gang (all but 1 of them either Bulgarian or Romanian) that they believe was responsible for the majority of the increased pickpocket statistics in the sites mentioned.
The Paris ring seems to come from similar areas, with an even darker twist -- terrorizing young girls unless they met their daily quota of thefts. It looks as if some Eastern European criminal elements have decided that, rather than victimizing their own nations, to instead "go where the money is" -- tourists in major capitals. Major-city police departments all over Europe need to learn from this to combat these petty-crime rings that harm tourism.
|
