Racist attacks in downtown Thessaloniki

Press release of the Antiracist Initiative of Thessaloniki - Antifascist Assembly for solidarity - NAFTHA - 31 May 2013

Translated by @IrateGreek

Bloody racist attacks against immigrants took place on Saturday 25 May for the first time in downtown Thessaloniki, highlighting in our city as well the level of barbarism that can result from the rise of racism and fascism. Two immigrants were stabbed, one of them to the neck, in two different parts of the city, and have already reported to the police that their attackers hurled racist threats at them before attacking them.

Specifically, on Saturday 25 May around midday, a group of Greeks heckled African street vendors in the area around Aristotelous square and Tsimiski street [translator's note: the most central area of downtown Thessaloniki], threatening that if they didn't leave the country, they'd kill them. At 4pm, according to eyewitnesses, two persons on a motorbike drove near a 39-year-old vendor from Rwanda and one of them tried to stab him in the neck. The migrant pulled back, thus avoiding the worst but with a light wound to the jugular. He was transferred to the Ippokrateion hospital where his wound was stitched up, while he gave his deposition about the incident to the police.

#rbnews weekly bulletin 18-24 May 2013

The text companion to this week's #rbnews international show is now online. You can read it after the jump.

14-year-old Ismael from Afghanistan, a victim of racist violence

Posted by @IrateGreek

14-year-old Ismael from Afghanistan was assaulted on Easter Monday in Athens by men in black who slashed his face with a broken bottle of beer. You can watch below his description of the attack in a video released by Médecins du Monde (Doctors of the World) and read the English translation of the dialogue. 

Greece: a new, tougher law against racism?

By @IrateGreek

Greek media hailed on 07 May 2013 a proposed new bill against racism that was reportedly prepared by the Ministry of Justice and will be submitted to parliament after the Easter holiday. According to news reports (see e.g. here, here, here and here), the new bill proposes much harsher penalties for all forms of hate speech, with prison sentences ranging from 3 to 6 years and fines up to €20,000, while deprivation of political rights would be considered in certain cases. Discussion of this bill began in the public debate as it was announced that parliament would discuss lifting the immunity of Golden Dawn MP Germenis following his assault on Mayor of Athens Kaminis last week during a food distribution "for Greeks only" organized by Golden Dawn.

#rbnews international show 20 April 2013: The anatomy of the Golden Dawn vote

This week on #rbnews international, our guest was sociologist Vangelis Lagos, who is participating in the European research project MYPLACE (Memory, Youth, Political Legacy And Civic Engagement). The purpose of MYPLACE is to explore how young people's social participation is shaped by the shadows (past, present and future) of totalitarianism and populism in Europe. We discussed the reasons why more than 400,000 chose to vote, in the spring of 2012, for the neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn.

You can listen to the podcast, as usual, after the jump.

#rbnews international show 13 April 2013: The Black Book of Golden Dawn

This week on #rbnews international, we continued our series of fascism and anti-fascism in Greece with an interview with Dimitris Psarras. Dimitris is a journalist with the investigative team Ios, whose reports are currently published by the Editors' Newspaper. He published in October 2012 a book titled The Black Book of Golden Dawn (Polis), a comprehensive summary of the years of research he conducted into the history and activities of Greece's neo-Nazi party. He is also the author of The secret hand of Karatzaferis: the media rebirth of the Greek far-right (Alexandria, 2010).

You can listen to the podcast, as usual, after the jump. We added some explanatory notes for those who are not familiar with details of Greece's political scene.

#rbnews international show 06 April 2013: Nationalism and national identity in Greece

This week on #rbnews international, we inaugurated a series of shows about fascism and anti-fascism in Greece with an interview with Athanasia Anagnostopoulou, a historian and associate professor in Panteion University in Athens. We discussed the formation of Greek national identity and its evolution towards elements of aggressive, dangerous nationalism not only in the recent crisis years, which saw the rise of Golden Dawn, but also in past decades, where the basis for such a form of nationalism was established.

You can listen to the podcast, as usual, after the jump.

#rbnews weekly bulletin 02-08 March 2013

The text companion to this week's #rbnews international show is now online. You can read it after the jump.

#rbnews international weekly bulletin 19-25 January 2013

The text companion of the #rbnews international show of 26 January 2013 is online. You can read it after the jump.

#19fgr by #rbnews community

Today's antifascist demonstrations in Athens and other European cities as recorded by the community of #rbnews

Bulletin d'informations du 19 janvier 2013 en Grèce - #15

Bulletin d'informations du 19 janvier 2013 en Grèce - #15 by Krot on Mixcloud

1. Invasion au squat Lelas Karagianni, manifestations de solidarité, oppression policiére

Quelques jours après la deuxième attaque de la police contre le squat Villa Amalias et l’évacuation du squat Skaramaga, et trois jours seulement après la grande manifestation de solidarité avec tous les squats en danger en Grèce, la police grecque a envahi un autre squat à Athènes, mardi 15 janvier. Cette fois, ça a été le tour du squat Lelas Karagianni, dans le centre ville d’Athènes, près d’un marché public.
Peu après midi, les forces de police ont investi le squat et arrêté 16 personnes sur le toit, pendant que l’hélicoptère de la police bourdonnait au-dessus de leurs têtes. Les personnes interpelées ont été emmenées au commissariat central de la Police d’Athènes pour un “contrôle”, tandis que d’autres policiers fouillaient le bâtiment. Plusieurs personnes se sont rassemblées devant le squat par solidarité avec les personnes interpelées, et finalement relâchées quelques heures plus tard, faute de preuves. Une seconde manifestation de solidarité s’est déroulée l’après midi, suivie d’une assemblée générale.
Ces événements surviennent après une succession d’interventions de la police dans d’autres espaces auto-gérés du même type, comme Villa Amalias (attaquée deux fois), le squat Skaramaga, la radio Entassi, hébergée dans l’Université Économique d’Athènes, et le squat Xanadu dans le nord du pays. Les deux premières agressions ont entraînées l’arrestation et l’inculpation de 92 personnes.

Brussels: antifascist city 18/1 [video]

Brussels was the first city to participate in the day of action against fascism of 19 January. The Solidarity Initiative to Greece from Brussels actually made their action earlier today. They hang this poster on the central European Commission building, gave out information leaflets to passers-by and discussed a bit on fascism with them.

In their facebook page, we read:

Today at 13h members of the Initiative stood outside European Commission's Berlaymont building in solidarity to tomorrow's Antifascist Day of Action - Athens Antifascist City. They conducted street interviews and put up a banner displaying 'EC-ECB-IMF Proud sponsors of fascism in Greece!' and gave out leaflets. In an echo of the events that led to World War II, Europe is once again facing the rise of fascism. Last year, the Neo-Nazi Golden Dawn (GD) party received 6.9 percent in the general election of June garnering 18 MPs, managing to institutionalize their message of hate. GD, now third in opinion polls, routinely organizes street raids in areas with dense immigrant population, often beating up or even killing people. Their members-MPs included-have been openly committing hate attacks but very rarely convicted. Their MPs, protected under the parliamentary immunity, never miss an opportunity to threaten with violence all those deemed race traitors.

Bulletin d'informations du 22 décembre 2012 en Grèce - #11

Bulletin d'informations du 15 décembre 2012 en Grèce - #11 by Krot on Mixcloud

1. Naufrage d’immigrants à Mytilini

21 morts, 6 personnes disparues et un survivant est le bilan du naufrage d’un bateau qui transportait des immigrants à Mytilène, une île dans le nord de la mer Egée, samedi 15 décembre. Les immigrants étaient d’origine afganne et, parmi eux il y avaient des bébés et des enfants, tandis que le survivant est un mineur. Il s’agit d’encore une tragédie de ce genre, parmi plusieurs qui se passent très souvent dans la mer Egée. En plus, les flux migratoires par la voie marine se sont multipliés au cours des derniers mois, parce que les contrôles à la frontière continentale avec la Turquie se sont intensifiés. En même temps, les travaux pour la construction d’un mur au long de la ligne frontalière de Evros avec la Turquie ont été complétés. L’objectif de ce mur est de servir d’obstacle à l’entrée des immigrants et son coût total se lève à € 3.160.000.

#rbnews international show 17 November 2012

By @IrateGreek

On the #rbnews international show on 17 November 2012, our guest was Joanna Kakissis, journalist with National Public Radio and Time magazine. We discussed the commemoration of the 1973 Polytechnic University uprising, the delay in the disbursement of Greece's latest tranche of bailout loans, and the independence (or not) of the Greek judiciary. You can follow Joanna on Twitter @joannakakissis

In tribute to the 1973 Polytechnic uprising but also to celebrate World Tolerance Day on 16 November, we played songs from "Our Great Circus", an anti-Junta musical first performed in Athens in the summer of 1973. The promotion of World Tolerance Day is supported by the 1 Against Racism network.

You can listen to the podcast and download the weekly news bulletin in English after the jump.

Informativo semanal desde Grecia #5 - 10 Noviembre 2012

Radiobubble Informativo Semanal 10 Noviembre 2012 by Mpatman on Mixcloud

#rbnews international show - 06 October 2012

In the second #rbnews English-language show of this season covering the period 30 September-06 October 2012, we discussed the Lagarde list, the new austerity measures, the multiple detentions and arrests by the police and torture cases and upcoming events in Greece, as well as developments with regards to the financial crisis in other European countries. The podcast is available after the jump.

Pogrom against Pakistanis at Nikaia

Translated by @iptamenos33

New attacks by extreme-right wing groups against Pakistanis took place last Friday and Saturday night in Nikaia (Piraeus suburb). After the threats and the ultimatums that were distributed amongst Pakistani shop owners by groups of the extreme right –Golden Dawn –according to eyewitnesses- and after the anti-racism demonstration of last Thursday, the racist groups struck again.

Far-right popularity amid austerity and xenophobia

By @inflammatory_

Approximately 20 far-right activists wearing helmets and holding bats reportedly attacked university students affiliated with left wing political groups. The attack, which appeared to be well organised and targeted, took place in Athens University's school of science early this afternoon during students’ union assembly. Three students were transferred to hospital suffering injuries.The fascists were allegedly members of National People's Front and Chrysi Avgi (Golden Dawn). 

Various polls* released in the previous week, show Golden Dawn picking up 2.3-3.4% of the national vote, raising fears that "armed conflict" might become a legitimate form of political expression. With Greece under harsh austerity measures, social tensions and xenophobia are on the rise. In an attempt to get voters back who have switched to Golden Dawn, LAOS far-right party leader Giorgos Karatzaferis, has been advocating for gun permit as a means of citizens' protection against illegal immigrants. 

Meanwhile, 300 undocumented immigrants have been detained by police, as Minister of Citizen Protection, Michael Chrysochoidis has ordered a "sweep" operation in central Athens. Thirty disused military camps across the country are planned to operate before elections as detention centres, aiming to provide housing for illegal immigrants. Northern prefecture's official Aris Giannakidis, argues among others, that "immigration influx is a European issue. We cannot carry its burdens alone on our shoulders".

*polls by Kapa Research, MRM, Marc