Tuesday - November 13, 2007

Crete: Europe's Wild West

Who would have thought that in the paradise that is the EU, there would be a haven for drug growing, gun using bandits? Crete, it seems, is the wild west of Europe and is plagued by lawlessness, though finally, it seems, Athens has had enough.

The ambush was not wholly unexpected. More than 40 armed police officers arrived at the Cretan mountain village of Zoniana in a convoy of a dozen vehicles. But even they were shocked by the force of the response as at least 20 gunmen opened fire on them with Kalashnikov assault rifles before they could pass the first houses in the village.

The one-sided gun battle lasted a matter of minutes as the police who had come searching for drugs withdrew with three officers wounded, one seriously.

What the firefight has achieved is the lifting of a veil of silence surrounding Zoniana that appears to have been at the centre of a lawless mini-republic controlling orchards of cannabis plants, drug dealing, protection rackets and armed robbery from a mountain base among the olive trees and the shepherds.

Crete has long been famed for its independent streak. It has the highest gun ownership rates in the European Union and even a high profile weapons amnesty, led by the composer Mikis Theodorakis, who was born on the island, has failed to end Cretans' love affair with guns.

However, the lax attitude to law enforcement and the culture of non-co-operation with the state appears to have spawned a criminal enterprise in the mountains that the rest of the island can no longer tolerate.

Last week, the Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis was forced to give assurances in parliament that the law does apply even above sea level in Crete: "We will no longer tolerate behaviour outside the law – the law applies to everyone and will be enforced for everyone," he said. Read more....

Author: The Machiavellian
Technorati Tags: Greece Crete
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