COPENHAGEN, Denmark – The now-aging hippies who took over a derelict naval base in Copenhagen more than 50 years ago and turned it into a freewheeling community known as Christiania want to boot out criminals who control the community’s lucrative market for hashish by ripping up the cobblestoned street where it openly changes hands.
Danish Justice Minister Peter Hummelgaard, who was present at the ceremony, said he believes that the excavation of Pusher Street and the individual cobblestones has high symbolic value. The plan is to create “a new Christiania without the criminal hashish market,” said Mette Prag, coordinator of a new public housing project in the enclave. Prag, who has lived in Christiania for 37 years, likened it to “a village.”
The residents eventually were given the right to use the land, but not to own it. After more than four decades of locking horns with authorities, they were given control over their homes in 2011, when the state sold the 84-acre enclave for 125.4 million kroner to a foundation owned by its inhabitants. Currently, nearly 800 adults and about 200 children live there, according to Prag, with up to 25% of the residents above the age of 60.
Over the years, Christiania has become one of Copenhagen’s biggest tourist attractions, a magnet for Danes as well as foreigners. Some come to be offended by the open sale of hashish – authorities for years tolerated the hashish trade on Pusher Street – and others to buy weed. Christiania banned hard drugs in 1980.In 2004, police began cracking down on drug-related activities – worth millions according to police – controlled by the Hells Angels and the outlawed Loyal to Family.
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