Greece vs. America?!?

[Update : The activities of naughty Greek anarchists (in smashing state-sponsored police CCTV cameras) is further mentioned in an AP report, U.S. experts examine footage of Athens embassy attack caught on camera, International Herald Tribune, January 16, 2007. According to the report, “In the pre-dawn attack, which apparently targeted the blue and white embassy seal, the anti-tank weapon smashed a window and damaged a third-floor toilet. It was the first major strike in Greece by suspected left-wing militants on a Western target in six years. Police blame Greek left-wing militants, but there have been no arrests and no statement from any group”. Which fact tends to contradict the assertion that the attack was the responsibility of Revolutionary Struggle…]

Anarchists own up (ekathimerini.com, January 12, 2007):

“Self-styled [shit — is there any other kind in the minds of bourgeois pundits?] anarchist group Revolutionary Liberation Action claimed responsibility yesterday for a series of arson attacks on three banks and the offices of New Democracy in Patissia, central Athens, earlier in the day. Branches of Eurobank, National Bank and Geniki Bank were damaged in separate attacks across Athens in firebombings using cooking gas canisters. No one was hurt in the incidents which all took place around 3 a.m. The group said that the attacks were made in support of three convicted anarchists [arrested at the May 6 Fourth European Social Forum protests in Athens] who have launched a hunger strike“; [Bombs & Shields].

The US Government-sponsored MIPT Terrorism Knowledge Base* describes RLA as “a small group that [prior to these latest incidents] has claimed responsibility for two arson incidents in Greece” (in October 2002 and December 2003), and which “mimic[s] the actions of many other short-lived groups that sporadically appear in Greece. Most of these groups are comprised of 18-25 year old men that [allegedly] voice support for [the now defunct, as a result of a series of successful Government prosecutions prior to the Olympic Games in Athens] 17 November in order to express their general discontent with their government or position in life.”

Another, Marxist mob, calling itself Revolutionary Struggle, has generated vast amounts of media reportage following its attack upon the US Embassy in Athens on January 12. The group successfully struggled to launch a rocket at the Embassy in an action which Malcolm Brabant of BBC News Athens has predictably ‘analysed’ as an example of ‘Greek anti-Americanism‘ (January 12, 2007) and whom, in a rare concession to reality, has noted that “Many Greeks will have reacted with satisfaction to the dawn rocket attack on the US embassy in Athens”, further noting that this reaction is in turn a product of long-standing US Government support for military dictatorship (1967–1974) and authoritarian rule in Greece, as well as the current slaughter in the Gulf.

    *”The Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism (MIPT) is a non-profit organization dedicated to preventing terrorism on U.S. soil or mitigating its effects. MIPT was established after the April 1995 bombing of the Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City, and it is funded through the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Grants and Training (G&T).” US state-sponsored terrorism does not exist as far as the MIPT is concerned, natch. See also : ‘Anarchist group detonates devices next to ND office and embassy car’, ekathimerini.com, December 22, 2006; one of a large number of similar actions that are rarely reported in the Western corporate/state media.

…And in @-Infos news just to hand:

Today, January 13, 2007, police attacked the anarchist and anti-authoritarian motorbike demo in solidarity with the three comrades arrested at the Social Forum on May 6, 2006 in Athens. The demo was attacked by special motorbike forces (Z team) on the way back from Nikea hospital, where there had been a solidarity gathering for two of the imprisoned comrades — Tarasio Zadorozni and Gerasimos Kiriakopulos — who are on hunger strike.

The (anti-)riot police squads (MAT) then stormed the comrades on the ground: 42 were taken into custody at the national security police headquarters in Athens, many of them injured, and 4 of them are still being held 9 hours later.

Tarasio Zadorozni and Gerasimos Kiriakopulos have been on hunger strike for 46 and 28 days respectively, and were transferred from Koridalos prison to a secure unit in Nikea hospital on January 9 as their condition had deteriorated.

They have been held in prison since May 6, 2006 along with another demonstrator, Kostas Kachadouras, accused of rioting during the international anti-war demo of the European Social Forum in Athens.

The imprisoned demonstrators of May 6 are 3 of the thousands of people that took to the streets that day when riots erupted between the forces of repression and anarchists and young rebels, and attacks were made against state and capitalist targets. The police arrested 17 demonstrators who were accused on (trumped-up) heavy charges, and 3 of them have been held in prison awaiting trial without any evidence against them (with the political consent of the traditional leftist parties and groups) so that they can be punished, and serve as an example to those who choose to resist without mediation or institutional representation.

The struggle that those on hunger strike began for their freedom, using their body as a weapon, has now become the terrain on which a general conflict between the state and those who fight it is being expressed.

It is about an attack in which the state, using all the repressive mechanisms of propaganda and control in its power, is attempting to isolate and eliminate anarchists and anti-authoritarians, who are the most radical part of social resistance, with the surrender of the whole of society as its final objective.

Under these conditions of intensifying state terror, every action of solidarity with the imprisoned fighters has been under attack. The aim of this repression is not only to keep the 3 in prison as long as possible, it is also to eliminate the very dynamic of solidarity, self-organisation and resistance against the plans of the state and the bosses.

So, on January 12, the police attempted to prevent the solidarity demonstration that had been organised by anarchists and anti-authoritarians. The order was pronounced by the chief of police forces present, stating that he had instructions from the prosecutor; but this was subverted by the persistence of the demonstrators and finally a strong demo was held in the centre of Athens.

The attack on today’s demonstration (January 13), with the arrests and the wounded, is the peak of this repressive violence, showing the state’s intent to bury the struggle of those on hunger strike in silence, to terrorise those in solidarity and attack the development of the anarchist struggle.

What has preceded today’s events: the arrest of an anti-authoritarian comrade outside his home following the motorbike demo to the house of the minister of justice; intensive provocation and pressure by the Z motorbike police squad on another motorbike demo to Koridalos prison on December 15; a police attack on the New Year’s Eve motorbike demo on its return from the prison (that resulted in many comrades being taken into custody and one arrest), and, on January 9, the surrounding by (anti-)riot police squads of a radio station which had been occupied by 50 anarchists in order to transmit solidarity messages and news of the hunger strike.

AGAINST the attempts of the state to isolate the struggle of our imprisoned comrades who are on hunger strike behind a wall of silence;

AGAINST the constant repressive attacks against anarchists and anti-authoritarians, aiming at their isolation and annihilation;

AGAINST the attempt to impose social acquiescence;

WE ARE TAKING OVER THE POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF ATHENS!

AND WE DEMAND:

THE IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF OUR 4 COMRADES BEING HELD IN THE NATIONAL SECURITY BUILDING FOLLOWING TODAY’S ATTACK BY POLICE AGAINST THE SOLIDARITY MOTORBIKE DEMO;

AND

THE IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF THE IMPRISONED PROTESTORS OF MAY 6, 2006!

By taking over this University building we are creating a place of constant counter-information and solidarity within our city, an attempt that is operating horizontally and against all hierarchy, on the basis of the occupiers’ general assembly.

No repressive action will extinguish our solidarity with our imprisoned comrades, or prevent the social struggle for liberation from the chains of Authority.

THE PASSION FOR FREEDOM IS STRONGER THAN ANY PRISON CELL!

SOLIDARITY TO THE HUNGER-STRIKERS:

TARASIO ZADOROZNI (SINCE NOVEMBER 29 2006)

AND

GERASIMOS KIRIAKOPULOS (SINCE DECEMBER 15 2006).

IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF THE 3 IMPRISONED PROTESTORS OF MAY 6!

THE IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF OUR 4 COMRADES WHO ARE BEING HELD IN THE NATIONAL SECURITY BUILDING FOLLOWING TODAY’S ATTACK BY POLICE AGAINST THE SOLIDARITY MOTORBIKE DEMO!

SOLIDARITY TO ALL IMPRISONED AND ACCUSED SOCIAL FIGHTERS!

FREEDOM TO ALL THOSE IN PRISON CELLS!

SOLIDARITY IS OUR WEAPON!

Assembly of the Occupied Polytechnic University (January 13 2007, 7pm).

PS. At the time of writing the four arrested have been set free, one with serious chest and back wounds, and many stitches in the head. The occupation continues…

About @ndy

I live in Melbourne, Australia. I like anarchy. I don't like nazis. I enjoy eating pizza and drinking beer. I barrack for the greatest football team on Earth: Collingwood Magpies. The 2024 premiership's a cakewalk for the good old Collingwood.
This entry was posted in Anarchism, Anti-fascism, History, Media, State / Politics, War on Terror. Bookmark the permalink.

4 Responses to Greece vs. America?!?

  1. Solidarity and our bodies are indeed excellent weapons against a hostile State. If only the majority of the population could realise that the power to change the system and lift themselves and their fellow brothers and sisters out of the black hole called capitalism is so very simple. We have the power. Problem is most of us don’t realise it.

  2. @ndy says:

    “There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part, you can’t even passively take part, and you’ve got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you’ve got to make it stop! And you’ve got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you’re free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!”

    — Mario Savio (1942–1996)

    Mario Savio’s FBI Odyssey: How the man who challenged ‘the machine’ got caught in the gears and wheels of J. Edgar Hoover’s bureau, Seth Rosenfeld, San Francisco Chronicle, October 10, 2004:

    http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/10/CMGP08OOFI1.DTL

    Closet drag queen “Hoover turned his surveillance machine on Savio: the indexes, dossiers, watch lists and informers; the liaisons with local police and the CIA; the discreet contacts with neighbors, school officials and employers; and, finally, covert action to “disrupt” and “neutralize” him…”

  3. Do you have the story in Greek? I can read Greek!

  4. @ndy says:

    Hi Miss P,

    http://athens.indymedia.org will no doubt have coverage… lemme know what you find?

    Cheers,

    @ndy.

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