Security, a decisive factor underlying each and every Olympics, is no exception to and the biggest challenge for the coming Athens Olympic Games, which is the first summer Games since the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

Up to now, Greece expects to spend unprecedented 1.2 billion euros (1.5 billion US dollars) on the Games' security, five times more than that in Sydney Games. Will the highest ever spending in Olympic history be paid off?

July 1, the date for the deployment of Olympic security in Greece, saw the strengthening security, with a total of 37,000 specially trained police, coast guards and army personnel

stationed around the Olympic venues and facilities during the Olympics. Moreover, another 4,000 police officers will arrive from the provinces early next month to take care of Athens' city patrol, and a 60m long airship equipped with high-resolution cameras will play a key role in guarding the Athens Olympic Games from terror attacks.

About 1,000 men will be deployed at the athletes' village, as many as in Piraeus and the Athens airport. As a high-level ministry official said, security forces must familiarize themselves with security equipment one month prior to the opening of the Games.

Until now, Greece expects to spend around 1.2 billion euros (1.5 billion dollars) on the Games' security -- five times more than that in the previous Sydney Olympics and 50 times more than that in Atlanta.

After bombings of commuter trains in Madrid in March, Greece asked for NATO's help and NATO will provide AWACS air surveillance planes and parts of its Mediterranean fleet as well as its biochemical battalion unit to safeguard the Games.

NATO's involvement, however, has caused controversy. Athens officially refused to allow the presence of armed, foreign guards to stay in Olympic venues during the Games, citing that this would undermine its authority and could cause incidents from foreign guards' unfamiliarization with the local environment, but on July 9 it accepted US armed agents to protect American athletes during a major pre-Olympic training camp, which will involve most of US athletics team members.

A senior Greek security official said that at least 45 US agents will escort the American athletes to Crete in early August and "about 24 of them will have a permit by Greek authorities to carry weapons." This goes to show that armed foreign guards may be allowed to stay in Athens during the Games.

Whether other countries will bring armed security men to training places is still unclear.

Since the adoption of the European Security Strategy last December, "effective multilateralism" has been enforced, thus EU will take the responsibilities by helping Greece during the Games.

In addition, Greece has gained advice from a security advisory group, constituting 7 nations and led by the United States and Britain. These countries include the United States, Britain, Australia, Germany, France, Spain and Israel and other countries like Russia, Italy and China are providing intelligence.

Greece's neighboring countries including Albania, Macedonia, Bulgaria and Turkey have done their part on border patrols to watch over extremists, while international police agencies Europol and Interpol are also working closely with Greek authorities.

According to the Athens Daily To Vima, the final installment of $173 million has been suspended since the Greek government is not sure about whether the security system will be ready for the Aug. 13 opening of the games. SAIC, short for Science Applications International Corp, is the contractor taking care of installing thousands of infrared and high-resolution cameras around the capital and Olympic venues, as well as a secure communication and information and radio system for security services. But there have been delays since SAIC should have delivered the system by May 28 as stipulated in the contract. Nevertheless SAIC blamed this on construction delays of Olympic venues.

To Vima reported that the government committee in charge of overseeing the security system has not signed the final contract papers with SAIC. Public Order Ministry officials have admitted that there had been some problems but reiterate that the security system will be ready in time.

Greek security officials said so far there has been no threat against the Games from extremist Islamist groups. But some small bomb attacks in recent months concerned Greek officials. On May 5, three explosive devices blew up outside an Athens police station without causing any serious damage. Later the "Revolutionary Struggle," which claimed responsibility for the attack, has threatened rich Olympic spectators and security officials and described them as "undesirables".

Greek officials assure critics, saying that such groups do not have the ability to sway the Games and stressing that hundreds of security cameras have been installed all over Athens to stop these local groups from taking actions. One fact should be noted that on July 15 a prosecutor charged a 20th suspect with being a member of the November 17 terrorist gang, seven months after a court sentenced 15 of its members to long prison terms, irrespective of which, however, some members of November 17 are unknown and still at large.

Public Order Minister George Voulgarakis once said that ministries were coordinating well in security for the Athens 2004 Olympics in August.

Voulgarakis mentioned that the deployment of police was completed, and that a great deal of exercises, including the last major one on July 5, were being held in order to find any problems underlying planning or operations. In addition, the Hellenic Coast Guard received three high-technology patrol boats from the US government as part of an aid program to combat terrorism, and will use them as part of security for the games.

Athens did spend a lot and made unremitting efforts to stage a safe and secure Olympics but worries still exist such as delays in installation of security system will definitely affect its tests, which may leave some unexpected vulnerability.

Controversy over whether to allow foreign armed agents to stay in Athens during the Games will be another big issue, which may bring trouble to Athens' planned security operations. Hackers will not let go of such a great "chance" to challenge the much more expensive security system. As computer security experts estimate, there are at least 1,500 successful hacks into systems each day in the world. Besides, blackouts, crashing servers, emergency reprogramming etc. will pose more threats. Once the security system undergoes a breakdown, a safe Olympics will remain an uncertainty.

Source: Xinhua