EU leaders need to take action if they do not want to lose tourists, businesspeople and investors

Waiting for a colleague on a late afternoon in Brussels recently I got a text message saying she was at a police station reporting that she had been robbed and assaulted. Later she told me what had happened. She had left her home in the Schumann area, near European Union headquarters, just before dusk to take a bus to meet me. Before she could do so, a man brandishing a knife forced her to part with her handbag, which contained, among other things, her wallet, voice recorder and camera, and fled with it.

Too shocked at first to react, she gathered her wits when she spotted a taxi. Getting in, she asked the driver for help. He not only followed the robber, but also alerted police and other taxi drivers about the crime and the description of the perpetrator.

My colleague said that more than 10 taxis and a couple of police cars zoomed in on the robber, who threw the stolen handbag onto the road and fled.

Two months before this robbery, after attending a meeting in Paris one night, several colleagues were on their way to a restaurant when a pickpocket tried to steal something from a handbag belonging to one of them. She was alert to the dangers lurking on the streets of Paris and stunned the pickpocket, grabbing his hand and giving him a verbal lashing. The shocked pickpocket fled.

A third Chinese woman, who works for a law firm in Brussels, became the target of another pickpocket while traveling by bus. Realizing her billfold had been stolen - it also contained her passport, which she needed to go on a business trip to China the following week - she decided to act tough.

She asked the bus driver to keep the doors closed because she suspected the pickpocket was still on the bus, and she asked to have her belongings returned, especially her passport, or else she would call the police. After a moment's silence, someone shouted that her billfold was lying on the floor.

Although my personal experience with pickpockets has not been as daring or as lucky, it also gives an indication of the deteriorating law and order situation in Europe. A couple of months ago on the Brussels subway I became preoccupied, reading a newspaper and looking at the Internet on my mobile phone. Later, on my return trip, I realized my wallet, which contained my ID and credit cards, was gone. I immediately reported the matter to police but, perhaps not surprisingly, I have not seen the wallet again.

European leaders have been preparing to meet to discuss ways to fight terrorism in the aftermath of the raid on the offices of the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris a month ago, in which 13 people were killed. Terrorism is indeed a threat to European society, but so is rising petty and not-so-petty crime across Europe.

Many attribute this to the European Union's struggling economy and resulting high unemployment over the past six years or so.

That may be true, and it should not be forgotten that Europe remains a magnet for international travelers, many of them Chinese tourists. Perhaps the robber and the pickpockets who targeted the three Chinese women believed they were tourists and would not be very careful with their belongings. They were right that Chinese tourists are not very careful with their belongings but wrong in assuming that the three women were tourists, if that is indeed what they thought.

Of course many victims of pickpockets and robbers may not even report the incidents to police. But judging by the recorded cases, Europe is becoming increasingly unsafe for foreigners, especially Chinese tourists and businesspeople.

My colleague has said that if she cannot be sure of her safety in Brussels she will simply leave. I can imagine that if things do not improve, the thoughts of Chinese tourists and investors will be along the same lines: They will decide to stay away.

The challenge for EU politicians is to do something about this or face the consequences.

The author is China Daily chief correspondent in Brussels. Contact the writer at fujing@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily European Weekly 02/13/2015 page13)