Security intact, officials say
2004-08-15 14:53
Athens - An undercover British reporter upped the ante in a longstanding game of cat-and-mouse between Greek police and foreign journalists testing Olympic security, drawing an angry response from Greek officials.
The British tabloid Sunday Mirror said on Sunday its reporter Bob Graham, who had got a job as a lift car boy at the stadium under an alias, planted three mock bombs that went undetected by a security sweep conducted before the Games' opening ceremony on Friday.
Greek authorities have promised ultra-tight security for the Olympiad, the first summer Games since the September 11 attacks in the United States in 2001 carried out by Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network.
"I would recommend Mr Graham read fewer detective stories," Greece's Public Order Minister Yiorgos Voulgarakis said in a written response to the report.
Foreign investigative reporters have been one of the biggest headaches for Greek security personnel protecting Olympic venues.
Since May, police have briefly detained at least 15 journalists for entering or filming Olympics-related venues without authorisation. They were all released after their identity was ascertained.
Some reporters admitted they entered the sites deliberately to test security measures. Back in May, after a British journalist said she had "easily" entered the arena of the main Olympics stadium which was then a worksite, Voulgarakis issued a veiled threat to journalists to "take security measures seriously", lest a police guard mistake them for a terrorist and act accordingly.
But other reporters said they simply ignored the requirement for specific authorisation to approach Olympics-related facilities - from Mexican and Chinese journalists who filmed anti-aircraft Patriot missiles to a US reporter filming solar-powered cars outside the Olympic stadium.
Earlier this month two Mexican reporters said they were beaten up in custody by Greek coastguards after filming outside the restricted security zone of the Athens port of Piraeus. Greek coastguard officials have opened an investigation into the incident. Paris-based media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) expressed its concern about "obstacles" to the journalistic coverage of the Games.
$4.1 billion spent on security
"All journalists can visit, film and take photographs of all the Olympic venues on condition they follow the agreed procedures," Athens Olympics Organisers ATHOC said in May in a statement.
Greece has made it a question of honour not to allow anything to blow holes in its unprecedented security curtain for the Games.
Athens is spending US$1.4bn on Olympic security. It is expected to deploy some more than 100 000 security personnel for the Games - outnumbering athletes by almost 11 to one - amid worldwide concerns of possible terror attacks at the world's premier sporting event.
Greece called in Nato to boost its own security measures after the March 11 train bombings in Madrid killed nearly 200 people.