Officers will patrol with French counterparts to prevent fellow citizens being targeted by pickpockets and muggers.
Paris police are to draft in reinforcements from China to help patrol the French capital during the summer tourist boom.
The foreign officers will be deployed to key landmarks to prevent Chinese visitors – around 1 million of whom come to France every year – being targeted by pickpockets and muggers.
A plan originating from the French Interior Ministry proposed that Chinese police officers would patrol with their French counterparts in Paris tourist spots. A ministry spokesperson refused to give details or numbers, but said their role would be preventative, and that they would operate as part of a global operation to protect tourists across the city.
Police say Chinese tourists often carry large amounts of cash, making them a target for attacks. Tourists from China are estimated to spend an average of €1,300 during their holidays, much of it on designer goods.
The move follows a rise in assaults by thieves on tourists from China. In March last year a group of 23 Chinese visitors were robbed in a restaurant shortly after arriving in Paris. The group was on a 12-day tour of Europe but stopped for dinner at Le Bourget in one of Paris’s northern suburbs, where they were robbed of €7,500 cash, plane tickets and passports. The group leader was injured in the attack.
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