BANGKOK/MOSCOW, January 28 (RIA Novosti) - Over 100 Thai taxi drivers staged a protest against Russian companies on Phuket, a popular resort island in Thailand, local media reported on Monday.
The protesters' main target was the Alex Tour agency in the Bang Tao beach area, which is believed to be Russian-owned.
The crowd first blocked the entrance to Alex Tour and then smashed the agency's sign, The Phuket News said.
The protesters, outraged by Russian businessmen charging lower prices than Thai companies, carried signs saying “Russian business get out” and “Bang Tao Russian mafia free.”
Russians are taking business and jobs away from the local Thai people, including in the taxi, laundry and restaurant segments, the protesters said.
“Whenever Russian tourists walk past, they go to the Russian-speaking businesses. The Russian businesspeople speak about the Thai people in a bad way: they say our services are expensive and we cheat people out of their money, and we have bad manners,” one of the protest leaders was quoted by The Phuket News as saying.
The protest follows a January 4 meeting of Phuket businessmen, who urged the local authorities “to block Russians from the tour, restaurant, massage and other businesses.”
Alexander Burtin, the commercial director of a leading Russian travel agency Tez Tour, told RIA Novosti that the protests were triggered by a number of small companies that hire Russians without work permits as tour guides.
“Many of them are often arrested by the police and have a lot of overdue fines to pay. Local Phuket television ran segments about such companies,” he said, adding that companies operating in other resort areas, such as Pattaya and Samui, had no similar problems.
