The city’s security woes have been exacerbated by a severe budget crunch, which has hampered the government’s ability to pay police officers. “What we’re seeing in public security is against the whole principle of the Olympics, the spirit of the Olympics,” he said. “The tension is palpable,” Meg Healy, 24, an American living in Rio, said before the Games got underway. Last year, the police were responsible for 20 percent of the city’s homicides, according to Amnesty International, which used data from the state’s Public Security Institute. Officials have sought to reassure visitors, pointing out that the security force is more than twice the number dispatched during the London Olympics of 2012.

Source: New York Times August 08, 2016 00:23 UTC