Greetings from Lisbon, Portugal

City: Lisbon

Country: Portugal

• What end of year festivities will be taking place in your city?

The most relevant events in the city of Lisbon by the end of the year, due to the high number of people that attend them are the Christmas Market in Park Eduardo VII during the month of December and the New Year’s Eve Celebration taking place in Terreiro do Paço on December 31st.

• Could you please describe briefly what additional measures are being taken to secure your city’s public spaces during the festivities?

Being events with high concentration of people, the National Public Security Police (PSP) has implemented some exceptional measures aiming the prevention of terrorist attacks.

These measures include:

1. The use of devices to prevent attacks using vehicles
2. Reinforcement of policing at certain critical periods through an enhanced policing profile (preventive visibility policing)
3. Conducting random searches (for the New Year’s Eve Celebration event)
4. Access control to detect certain objects that are not allowed in the venue (for New Year’s Eve Celebration)
5. Use of CCTV system (for New Year’s Eve Celebration event)

• What are the main challenges?

The implementation of these additional measures has the principal objective to increase the feeling of security, prevent possible terrorist attacks and simultaneously ensure that there is capacity to react in case of a terrorist attack.