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WORLD> Europe
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Greek shop owners in despair after riot damage
(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-12-09 09:42 ATHENS, Greece -- As riots left dozens of stores gutted across the Greek capital, one assistant at a china shop described how she felt after seeing her store in ruins.
"They broke our windows, but luckily we have strengthened glass and the fronts didn't come down," said the woman, who gave her name only as Eleni. Her fear then gave way to anger. "The thing is, nobody seems to care about the employees at the burnt shops, what will their fate be now over the Christmas season?" she asked. Athens shop owners pleaded Monday for protesters to suspend all demonstrations until the new year, but their call was ignored. More banks and shops were trashed Monday, the third day of riots in Greek cities following the fatal police shooting of a teenage boy on Saturday. Over the weekend, hundreds of youths wearing hoods and crash helmets went on the rampage for hours along Athens' busy shopping streets, smashing and burning stores, banks and parked cars, torching three large departments stores and damaging dozens more. "On Saturday, our colleagues were standing in front of their shops, watching them being smashed and saying 'My God what is happening?"' said Panayis Karellas, head of the Athens Traders Association. "This was a show of force by mindless people," he said. "At some point someone has to tell us who will pay for all this damage." Karellas said 130 businesses were damaged during the weekend riots. He did not give an estimate of the cost but said the timing would hurt many businesses pinning hopes of their financial survival on Christmas sales. According to the trade association, one in 10 businesses in the capital have been damaged by violent demonstrations and vandalism, with nearly half that number being forced to close permanently. Traffic-halting demonstrations are a near-daily occurrence in Athens, while heavy-handed policing is frowned upon. Karellas pleaded for financial assistance from the government and called on protest groups to suspend public rallies until after Christmas. "We have nothing against protesters," he said. "But every time there is a public rally, violent people blend in and cause trouble." Still, Greece's largest union, the GSEE, said it would go ahead with a major strike Wednesday that will ground most flights at Athens International Airport and disrupt transport services across Greece. On Ermou Street in the city's main commercial area, Christmas shoppers and noisy street musicians were back Monday. Nearly all stores opened for business after hastily installing new front windows overnight. Others simply placed tape or plywood boards around damaged areas. "The damage is terrible ... Everything was burnt in the shop. Luckily there was nobody in the building," said Lefteris Karagiannis, an engineer working at a sports shop destroyed by fire. One clothes shop assistant, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to store policy, said she was worried that many Christmas shoppers might avoid downtown Athens. "We haven't had any customers today, just nosy people coming and taking pictures with their mobile phones," she said. "I'm really afraid business will be very slow for the next two weeks." |
