Dozens of corona-police were deployed at Varnavas Square in Pangrati district of Athens on Friday to prevent young people from hanging out there and crowd on a spring night outside their homes.
Some 100 police, members of a corps with the incredible name “Management and Delimitation of Gatherings Squads” established last autumn, had to stare for hours at the benches, the iron rails and the trees of the square with a single aim: to prevent youth from reaching the area.
They had reportedly orders to not allow anyone into the square which is one of the very few green spots in a heavily populated area full of multi-storey apartment buildings.
Varnavas Square is one of the places where the lockdown-ridden youth loves to hang out with a coffee or a drink in their hands especially now that night are mild.
The youth meeting on Friday was spoiled with tax-payers money spent on safeguarding benches … but Alas! the boys and girls were to find alternative – and even worse corona-wise – solutions.
A party was “spontaneously” organized at Agios Georgios Square in another district of Athens.
In Kypseli, some 5 km away from Pangati, estimated 2 to 3 thousands young people gathered late on Friday and even danced to music thanks to a DJ.
No precaution measures, no masks.
Police did not intervene.
The only “authority” in the area were municipality cleaners on Saturday morning removing the garbage left behind.
Restaurants, cafes and bars have been shut down since November 2020, but they are allowed to sell only take away and delivery.
PS At least, the corona-police is dressed youth-friendly as if directly from the Smurfs village
I saw groups of teenagers out and about together last night in my area and it made me happy, this whole situation has been unfair on them.
I am not quite sure, but…do I get some slight sense of undertone here?
can’t keep people jailed forever. lockdown has been for a long time. as always, the people make the final decision, not the government.
they might as well open outdoor restaurants and bars now instead of all of this.
The rising number of people dying each day in Greece clearly indicates the opposite.
The death rate is increasing despite a vaccination program – I wonder why – probably because barely anyone in Greece appears to be following any of the basic rules put in place to prevent the spread of the virus anymore.
When the police do what is needed to stop large gatherings the stupid and selfish just find another way to gather. The police should just hand out knives to the youths and tell them to go home and kill their parents and grandparents and once they have done that they can open the bars and party all they like.
Thay tried to do the same thing here in Toronto a couple of days ago as our numbers are getting to 5000 cases per day in Ontario due to provincial government mishandling of the situation. They have been reactive as opposed to proactive. So the most recent decree was closing playgrounds for young children and allowing police to randomly stop people on foot and in cars to ask where they were going and why ($750 fine for noncompliance).
Parents took their kids to the playgrounds yesterday and police said they had better things to do than stop people. The government came up with some clarification that they only meant “large” (more than 10) gatherings. Εδώ γελάμε.