Greece has launched an international effort to reassure potential visitors to the Olympic Games after officials conceded on Thursday that two-thirds of the tickets have yet to be sold.
The low turnout is partly being blamed on members of the "Olympic family" -- sponsors, broadcasters and Olympic officials -- who have either returned tickets or elected not to come to the August extravaganza.
Speaking on the eve of a visit to London today, Dora Bakoyannis, the mayor of Athens, conceded that the sales were disappointing and implied that spectators may have been wrongly frightened from coming by fears of terrorism.
Fifty days before the start of the Olympics on August 13, Bakoyannis's visit coincides with the arrival in London of the Olympic flame. Athens is desperately stepping up efforts to sell seats for what have become the most expensive games ever after figures showed that of the 5.3 million tickets issued, 3.4 million are unsold.
In London, Bakoyannis, 49, is expected to underline the long and warm relationship between the countries when she appeals to Britons to attend the Olympics.
"It's important, after all, that we go on with life," said the mayor, who will oversee the flame lighting ceremony outside Buckingham Palace.
Asked if visitors were justified in being deterred by Athens' chaotic preparations, Bakoyannis said any organizational shortcomings would be made up by the "goodwill of the Greeks, their hospitality and individualism.
"Am I disappointed [by the sales]? Yes. But at the end of the day because the expectations are low the surprise will be big," Bakoyannis said.
Yesterday, as NATO pledged to deploy surveillance planes, maritime patrols and experts in weapons of mass destruction during the Olympics, Bakoyannis said she believed visitors had "nothing" to fear.
The Greeks had spent US$1.2 billion on safeguarding the games, the first summer Olympics since the Sept. 11 attacks.
"Athens is not London where the police chief has said openly it's not a matter of `if' but `when' there is an attack," said the mayor whose husband, the conservative politician Pavlos Bakoyannis, was gunned down in 1989 by the Greek terror group November 17.
"Greece has cracked November 17. And it has never been threatened or faced the threat of attack [from al-Qaeda]. We have good relations with the Arab world.
"There have been wonderful games before us, and there will be wonderful games after us," she continued, "but there is no other place in the world where the marathon will be run along the original route."
Faced with the excruciating spectacle of athletes competing before empty seats, the mayor has been spreading the message that the Athens games will be "different."
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