Drivers, horses to go hungry over port ban
Horse and carriage drivers in Hania, Crete, yesterday threatened to go on hunger strike and starve their animals after the city’s port authority banned them from providing rides to tourists along the waterfront. The decision to evict the drivers was made following an accident on Friday night in which a startled horse dragged its carriage into the sea and drowned. Five people had to be rescued from the water by onlookers. However, as the drivers protested in front of the prefecture yesterday, they said the authorities were just using the accident as a pretext to force them away from Hania’s historic Venetian port. The drivers said that if authorities had not reversed their decision by this morning, they, and their horses, would go on a hunger strike. They said they would then burn their carriages in the port.