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Victoria Mindova

Ten Bulgarians aged between 22 and 53 were arrested in Thessaloniki for attempted robbery of old rails. Dias officers saw how the accused were loading the rails into their personal car while patrolling in the area of Daphnis Street, where the warehouses of the Greek railway company OSE are located.

Unused rails were stored in the site. The police arrested the Bulgarians on the spot and now, they are waiting for the charge. According to the public relations department of the police in Thessaloniki, the offenders did not resist the police while being arrested.

"We have no information on whether the captured have a criminal record in Bulgaria. This is their first violation of the law in Greece," stated exclusively for GRReporter the press attaché of the Thessaloniki police Mrs. Stamoulaki. She said that the punishment for this type of theft, according to the Greek Penal Code, is between ten days and five years of imprisonment depending on the seriousness of the violation. She stressed that there had been no resistance at the time of the arrest and no injury or other damage had been caused to the authorities or their property. This implies that the court in Thessaloniki may be more sympathetic and give them a reduced sentence.

Robbing of metal cables, rails, caps and other metal objects is a known practice in some regions of Bulgaria, such as Ihtiman. In the spring of 2010, 210 passengers were blocked for four hours on a train between Kostenets and Ihtiman due to the theft of railway infrastructure. Then the thieves took away a few metres from the railways, which were operating and the fast train from Burgas to Sofia was running on them. The theft of rails caused the delay of another six trains on the same day.