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Athens` prostitutes up in arms against crackdown
Athens, Mar 01: With five months to go before the Olympics brings millions of visitors to Athens, the city is preparing to showcase the best it has to offer in wine and song, while wondering what to do about the women.
Athens, Mar 01: With five months to go before the Olympics brings millions of visitors to Athens, the city is preparing to showcase the best it has to offer in wine and song, while wondering what to do about the women.
A row about regulating the country's sex trade has reached an impasse as politicians, prostitutes, feminists and priests wait for next Sunday's elections to throw up a new government, all the while at each other's throats over how to deal with an industry that feeds around 70,000 people across Greece.
While authorities, led by Athens' first female mayor, Dora Bakoyianni, say they want to impose tighter restrictions on registered prostitution early to avoid a games boom, critics say a crackdown will only feed the much larger illicit trade.
''Are we legal prostitutes the problem, when we represent nine percent of the business out there and the rest is illegal and uncontrollable?'' said Dimitra Kanelopoulou, president of the Movement of Greek Prostitutes (KEGE).
''All over Athens there are signs for strip shows and live sex, and our little white light over the door is an issue?''
The rows centres on a 1999 law which made prostitution a legal profession for men and single women, specifying permits and health checks for sex workers, as well as tight rules on location including a 200-metre distance from civic buildings such as churches or schools.
The law was not enforced until the middle of last year, when officials revived it for a pre-games clean-up, saying enforcement would cut the 600-odd brothels operating in the city to 230.
Kege countered that all the prostitutes in the known brothels had permits and health certificates, and it was only the unworkable location restrictions of the 1999 law that made their houses illegal.
''We pay taxes, 200 euros social security every month, issue receipts and get health checks and still the police come and drag us to the station every other day,'' Kanelopoulou said.
''Some might soon not bother with permits, post an ad and do it on the sly. They are pushing us to illegality.''
Bureau Report
A row about regulating the country's sex trade has reached an impasse as politicians, prostitutes, feminists and priests wait for next Sunday's elections to throw up a new government, all the while at each other's throats over how to deal with an industry that feeds around 70,000 people across Greece.
While authorities, led by Athens' first female mayor, Dora Bakoyianni, say they want to impose tighter restrictions on registered prostitution early to avoid a games boom, critics say a crackdown will only feed the much larger illicit trade.
''Are we legal prostitutes the problem, when we represent nine percent of the business out there and the rest is illegal and uncontrollable?'' said Dimitra Kanelopoulou, president of the Movement of Greek Prostitutes (KEGE).
''All over Athens there are signs for strip shows and live sex, and our little white light over the door is an issue?''
The rows centres on a 1999 law which made prostitution a legal profession for men and single women, specifying permits and health checks for sex workers, as well as tight rules on location including a 200-metre distance from civic buildings such as churches or schools.
The law was not enforced until the middle of last year, when officials revived it for a pre-games clean-up, saying enforcement would cut the 600-odd brothels operating in the city to 230.
Kege countered that all the prostitutes in the known brothels had permits and health certificates, and it was only the unworkable location restrictions of the 1999 law that made their houses illegal.
''We pay taxes, 200 euros social security every month, issue receipts and get health checks and still the police come and drag us to the station every other day,'' Kanelopoulou said.
''Some might soon not bother with permits, post an ad and do it on the sly. They are pushing us to illegality.''
Bureau Report