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Australian embassies crack down on ‘pest’ travelers
Posted On 11 Dec 2014
Pic: AP.
AUSTRALIA’S government is attempting to curb Australian travelers’ soaring expectations of what help they can get from their embassies, such as a loan to pay a prostitute in Thailand or assistance to evict a polecat from a ceiling in the United States.
Foreign Minister Julie Bishop on Wednesday announced new measures to promote “a stronger culture of self-reliance and personal responsibility in the traveling public.”
“At most of our posts there are people we would describe colloquially as serial pests who are constantly bouncing back into the embassy because they’ve run out of money or they’ve got some sort of other personal problem and they often come to the embassy and the consular teams expecting us to solve their problems for them,” she said.
These measures include a new policy of providing minimal consular services to Australians who wilfully, repeatedly or negligently get themselves into trouble.
Australia’s busiest embassy is Bangkok, where an Australian walked in with a prostitute and was refused a loan to pay for services already provided.
Requests that Australian diplomats have fielded include help to remove a polecat and the loan of an armored car.
Additional reporting from Associated Press
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