Prague, Dec 10 (CTK) – The Foreign Ministry registers 263 Czech citizens who had problems with law, were detained by the local police or even ended up in prison abroad during the summer season, daily Pravo wrote on Saturday.
The biggest number, 66 Czechs, were detained in London.
This is followed by Croatia and Germany with 24 Czechs each, and Poland with 23 detained Czechs, Pravo writes.
While abroad, Czechs most often violate the traffic and alcohol drinking rules. However, the local police also deal with the cases of smuggling and drug-related crime implicating them, it adds.
A Czech, aged 63, ran into trouble while in Hong Kong where he was sentenced to 27 years in prison for cocaine smuggling, Pravo writes.
The police detained him at the Kai Tak Airport, to which he flew from Brazil. His luggage reportedly contained roughly six kilogrammes of the drug. The man pleads unguilty, claiming that someone else planted it in his luggage.
In all, 1,200 Czech citizens are serving their prison sentences abroad, according to the statistics published last year. The figures are to be updated by the Foreign Ministry next March, Pravo writes.
The Foreign Ministry has the data for the summer season, between this June and September.
“In Europe, the crime Czechs commit is very often connected with driving and alcohol drinking,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Irena Valentova is quoted as saying.
In Asia, Czechs are mostly involved in smuggling and in Latin and Central America in drug-related crime or the violation of the rules for the stay in the countries there.
The biggest number of jailed Czechs, over 300, is in Britain, followed by Germany and Austria, Pravo writes.
Britain registers four drug-related crimes, but Germany and Austria at least 40. This is associated with the problem of cross-border drug dealing, it adds.
In the USA, the authorities in Washington and Chicago register over 100 Czechs behind the bars, Pravo writes.
Czechs’ drug delicts have also caught the attention of the authorities in Peru where eight Czechs are in prison, seven of them over drug dealing, it adds.
