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Anastasia Balezdrova

Cheap alcohol and low accommodation prices in the resort of Malia on the island of Crete have been very attractive for young tourists for years. The coastal village ranks among the first on the list of favourite places of British teenagers who, every summer, make it appear in the beginning of newscasts at least once. The reasons are the challenging behaviour of drunk and half-naked youths and the fighting with each other.

This time, the dispute between British tourists ended in the most tragic way. Tourists of a large group had fought with each other and during the scrimmage, a young man, aged 19, stabbed and killed another man of his age.

The police in Crete found the attacker and apprehended him a few hours later. A day later, however, another British tourist appeared before the authorities and pleaded guilty. He said that, during the attack, he had held the knife which the police had found in a shoe in the room of the main suspect.

Despite the change during the preliminary proceedings, the prosecutor has brought charges against the 19-year-old suspect and directed the second British tourist who had presented himself as an attacker to the investigator for further investigation.

Photo: tanea.gr

The other participants in the attack have been charged with involvement in an attack to the degree of criminal offence. One of them was also accused of causing bodily harm.

Over the past few years, the same phenomenon has been observed on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast as well. A few days ago, British tabloid "The Sun" published material describing scenes of undisciplined behaviour and comic acts of drunken youths on Sunny Beach. The title of the article is "Bulgaria to Vulgaria Forget Magaluf and Malia, welcome to Sunny Beach."

GRReporter has decided to seek information about Malia where these scenes have been a daily round in the summer for at least 10 years already. We have contacted journalist Harris Leontakis from Crete who often covers such cases for the media for which he has been working.

According to him, over the past 2-3 years the situation has improved, the accidents are not so serious and involve a few participants.

"This is due to three factors. Firstly, the increased number of policemen. Secondly, both the employees of the aeroplanes by which the tourists are travelling and the British consular office in Athens warn them that they will be arrested at the slightest offence. Thirdly, the restaurant owners in Malia are involved in this attempt too by trying to stop any dispute or fight. Many of them have even employed security staff in their restaurants. They are walking in the streets, warning with their presence the young men that they should behave well."

The journalist does not deny that the tourists are continuing to fight with each other but not as they used to a few years ago. "Then, one could see literally everything in Malia. From sex in the street to whatever you can imagine."

The sight of drunken youths lying in the street without being able to move is quite common today too. And this is due to the low prices of alcohol. "In some restaurants, beer costs 0.50 to 1 euro and a whiskey 3 euro. All I can say is that the tourist packages for Malia are cheap. On the other hand, Club 18 - 30 of the British travel agency Thomas Cook has preferred this resort for years, sending its customers there."

A look at the agency's website shows the other places in Europe where British youths can spend their wild holidays at very low prices. They include San Antonio on the island of Ibiza, Malia on Crete, Laganas on Zakynthos, Kavos on Corfu, Magaluf on Majorca, Agia Napa in Cyprus, Faliraki on the island of Rhodes, Sunny Beach in Bulgaria and Kardamena on the island of Kos.

So, the question is about the position of hotel and restaurant owners the majority of whom are not locals in the specific case of Malia, according to Harris Leontakis. In his opinion, none of them is sincere when stating before television cameras that drunkards' acts should stop, especially in the case of a serious accident such as the murder on Tuesday.
 
"The locals want things to change, the other people too, but actually they do not do anything in this regard because they profit from this situation. When you ask them, they reply that they do not want to take the risk of the resort being built up with all inclusive hotels since the restaurants and shops outside the complexes will remain without any customers," he says.

Representatives of the local authorities confirm his words. According to the Deputy Mayor of Hersonissos municipality, the difficulties in disciplining young people aged between 17 and 21 years combined with the fact that many restaurant owners offer cheap alcohol to attract customers do not allow any change in the situation.