|
|
| Тема |
 zadavih se ot smiah - nashite MPta |
|
| Автор | TO (Нерегистриран) | |
| Публикувано | 08.02.03 16:37 |
|
|
|
As Reported by The New York Times ( i prepisano ot club BG v US):
Foreign Officials Evicted by Grocer
Bulgarian Group Mistaken for Roaming Band of Thieves
ST. Anthony, Minn. (AP) - A delegation of official visitors from Bulgaria was ordered out of a grocery store in this Minneapolis suburb on Friday when the store's owner, worried about reports of "gypsy-looking" shoplifters, mistook the group for gypsies.
The Bulgarians --five members of Parliament and several journalists-- were visiting the Minneapolis-St. Paul area as part of a national tour sponsored by the United States Information Agency. They were forced to leave the store, the Apache New Market, over the protests of two State Department interpreters who were escorting them.
"They just wanted to see what a neighborhood shopping center was like", said Dana Penoff, one of the interpreters. "Almost immediately after we walked in we heard this announcement that there was a suspicious group, that every shopper should be on alert. It turned out that everyone of us was being followed and watched."
Ms. Penoff said she would talk to state officials about filing a human-rights complaint. She said that she had tried to tell the store's owner and manager, Vern Berggaren, that the Bulgarians were guest of the United States, but he replied: "Put everything down and leave. We don't want your kind of people in this store."
Reports of Roving Shoplifters
Elena Poptodorova, a member of the delegation, said she told Mr. Berggren: "I am a member of Parliament. I have my credential with me. So would you please explain why you are behaving like that to me?"
In a broadcast interview later, Mr. Berggren said he was sorry for the misunderstanding but had been concerned after hearing reports that bands of roving shoplifters struck stores in Minnesota and Wisconsin a few days ago.
Law-enforcement officials said last week that the shoplifters --men, women, and children-- spoke a foreign language and operated by distracting store clerks while others in the band stole. In their description of the shoplifters, the officials used the term "gypsies".
"The description was either Eastern or gypsy-looking-type people", Mr. Berggren said, "And when they spoke, they spoke with a foreign accent". Referring to the Bulgarian visitors, he said, "They fit the description."
But Ms. Penoff said that such a mistake was incredible. "They are people who are very educated and very intelligent.", she said. "These people are well dressed and well behaved."
"I'm embarrassed as an American", she added. "To be in my own country and have one of my own countrymen behave like this is incredible".
| |
| |
| 
|
|
