By Jason Venter | 09-12-2012 | 11:00AM
News broke yesterday that two employees from Bohemia Interactive (Arma, Carrier Command) were arrested in Greece on the island of Lemnos. They were accused of spying.
Reports do not name the two men, but their ages are listed as 28 and 33. They were taking photographs of a Greek military base, so you can perhaps understand why Greece might be apprehensive about such activity and assume the worst. While the two men claim to have been researching for Arma III, a war shooter currently in development, they'll likely have a lot of questions to answer before any release from custody.
On the official Bohemia Interactive forums, a reader started a thread in response to a post on news247.gr. Bohemia Interactive's CEO, Marek Spanel, left a response that verifies the accuracy of that report and adds: “We prefer this topic not to be discussed on our forums atm, at least until we know more specific details about this case.” Naturally, he closed the thread.
Bohemia Interactive has released a statement that has been posted at on its official website. That statement reads as follows:
“We can confirm that two Bohemia Interactive employees, our colleagues and friends, were arrested during their holiday trip to Lemnos. They visited the island with the sole purpose of experiencing the island's beautiful surroundings.
Since its establishment in 1999, Bohemia Interactive has created games based only upon publicly available information. We always respect the law and we've never instructed anybody to violate the laws of any country. The same is true for Arma 3.
Currently, all our effort goes towards supporting the guys over there, as well as their friends and families affected by this difficult situation. We sincerely hope that this is an unfortunate misunderstanding of their passion as artists and creators of virtual worlds.”
There doesn't seem to be much point in further speculation until new information emerges, but in the meantime these men and their loved ones are in a difficult place and we wish them the best as they work toward a satisfactory resolution.
