Furious at the prospect of losing their exclusive parking spaces, Piraeus police yesterday arrested municipal employees setting up a children’s Christmas playground on the lot, the city’s mayor charged yesterday.

Yesterday morning, officers arrested a gang of workers engaged in erecting Christmas decorations and playground toys on the empty lot, which belongs to the Piraeus Municipality but has been ceded for years to the police, who use it to park their patrol cars.

Sources told Kathimerini that the officers said they were acting on the information that some of the laborers were illegal immigrants without work permits. The workers were released, but Piraeus Mayor Christos Agrapidis was furious.

“This is unacceptable, an insult to all the people of Piraeus,” he said.

The mayor claimed that the local police chief told him the arrests had been carried out “for hindering officers from parking police vehicles.”

Piraeus children are to get their playground after the municipality promised to provide police with alternative parking for the holidays.