SOS Malta!

I am a Romanian citizen with a Maltese ID card and I would like to express my concern, sadness and anger for something that occurred to me and to my friend.

On January 20, I was waiting at the Malta International Airport, for the helicopter, in order to reach my final destination, Gozo. I had two hours to wait inside the airport, so I started to read under the sign: Don't Smoke! My friend and I are allergic to smoke, so in order to be protected we sat, on purpose, in that area.

At a certain point, a Maltese man lit his cigarette next to me. I felt obliged to tell him that smoking was forbidden but he started to shout at me and at my friend, having a very violent reaction. He was together with another four men and they all approached my friend to hit him. The first one stopped in time, while one of his friends actually came to hit my friend and the other two men were throwing our luggage in my friend's direction.

Why? Because we were foreigners? Tourists in their opinion?

But I am wondering if we were actually tourists, and not residents with a Maltese passport, with what kind of thoughts and impression we would have left Malta? Of one thing I am sure! We would have told all our friends: Do not go to Malta!

And this is not good for the image of Maltese tourism, which is one of the most important sources for the Maltese economy, if not the only one. Another thing that I am amazed at is what were those men doing at the airport since they weren't there to board a flight.

And how was it possible that the only policeman, who was there by chance, was telling us to calm down and when we asked him to ask for the documents of the men he did not do it!

Fortunately, we took the identification number (because we knew that that was the procedure, something that tourists don't know) of the policeman and, once in Gozo, we went to our lawyer.

After a while two policemen appeared, then another two and another two... lunch was over!