Takis
a 26-year-old heroin user, in Koumoundourou Square.
Crimes by and against immigrants in Greece are on the rise while right-wing groups clamor for the expulsion of all illegal immigrants.
PHOTOGRAPH BY Gabriele Micalizzi/Cesuralab.
Recent images from Athens have mostly shown violent protests in response to the austerity program Greece has adopted to solve its debt crisis. Less public is the city’s skyrocketing violent crime rate.
According to police statistics, robberies almost doubled from 2008 to 2010; homicides are steadily increasing; and illegal immigrants continue to arrive, mostly from the Middle East, North Africa and the Indian subcontinent.
Crimes by and against immigrants are on the rise, while right-wing groups like Golden Dawn clamor for the expulsion of all illegal immigrants.
Golden Dawn would never act illegally and attack a mosque,”says the group’s spokesman, Elias Panayiotaros. But I’m sure the majority of Greeks aren’t saddened when something like that happens.
POPULATION OF METROPOLITAN ATHENS: 3.7 million.
ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS WHO ENTERED GREECE IN 2010: 128,000.
IMMIGRANT PORTION OF THE GREEK POPULATION: 15 percent.
CURRENT UNEMPLOYMENT RATE IN GREECE: 15.9 percent.
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