The participants of the G7 summit, which begins on Thursday in the southern Italian town of Apulia, are staying in a five-star beach hotel in Borgo Egnazia – something that the 2,500 police officers deployed to the region to secure the summit could only dream of: They were billeted on a dilapidated cruise ship on which, according to the police union COISP, “terrible sanitary conditions” prevailed. The ship has since been confiscated.
The ship was confiscated “after numerous complaints” and the police officers were accommodated in hotels, the union said. The “Mykonos Magic”, anchored in the port of Brindisi, had unusable toilets, dilapidated showers and flooded cabins.
The newspaper “La Republica” reported that the air conditioning was broken, water was dripping from the ceiling in the cabins and the officers had to wait for hours for a cold meal. Due to the heat and the broken air conditioning, they also had to sleep with the cabin doors open.
According to the police union SILF, the 2,500 police officers lived “crammed in like mice” on the ship. Security forces from across Italy were sent to Apulia for the three-day summit, which is also expected to be attended by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and US President Joe Biden.
The “Mykonos Magic” was formerly operated by Costa Cruises and now belongs to the Greek ferry company Seajets.