Showing posts with label Greece. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Greece. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 10, 2014

Athens Protest and Street Art - December 2014

Some pictures from Athens last weekend:

Demonstrators gather outside the university on 6 December, the 6th anniversary of the killing of 15 year-old Alexis Grigoropoulos by police. Thousands took to the streets to remember Alexis and to express solidarity with his friend Nikos Romanos,  on hunger strike in prison (the hunger strike has now ended).
Later there were clashes, with tear gas and petrol bombs (from BBC News)
Syrian refugees protesting at their camp in Syntagma Square, opposite the parliament building
'We faced death passing the sea, now we're sleeping at Greek streets'

Sunday December 7th - an art students banner on  protest outside Parliament against the setting of a new austerity budget
At least 5,000 (my estimate) took part in the Sunday evening protest
(image from here of a trade union contingent on demo)
Some street art from the Exarchia area:










Friday, September 20, 2013

Pavlos Fyssas (Killah P): anti-fascist rapper murdered in Greece

Demonstrations are continuing all over Greece following the murder of Pavlos Fyssas by fascists this week. An anti-fascist lost an eye on Wednesday after being hit by a police tear gas cannister, and numerous anti-fascists have been injured and/or arrested. Check Occupied London for latest updates.

A demo has been called in London at the Greek Embassy tomorrow (Saturday 21 September), 1 pm at 1a Holland Park, W11 (facebook event details here).

 From EAgainst.com:

'On the night of September 17th, a 34-year-old man died in the early hours of Wednesday morning after he was attacked by a neonazi (member of Golden Dawn) and subsequently stabbed in Piraeus. The victim has been named as Pavlos Fyssas (who went by the stage name of Killah P.), a hip-hopper involved in the antifascist scene, organising anti-racist concerts and other social activities in the area where he lived. He was stabbed in the chest outside a café at 60 Panayi Tsaldari Avenue in Amfiali, in the Keratsini district of Piraeus, shortly after midnight by a group of neonazis dressed in black and camouflage uniforms. The name of the 45-year murderer of Fyssas appears to be Giorgos Roupakias.

 More specifically, Pavlos’ friends made a remark against Golden Dawn inside a cafe where they were watching a football match. Somebody from a nearby table overheard them and made a phonecall to Golden Dawn members. Golden Dawn squads arrived almost simultaneously with DIAS motorbike police. Pavlos tried to help his friends evade the scene, but he was ambushed by another Golden Dawn squad and surrounded. Then another Golden Dawn associate drove with his car opposite in an one-way street, stopped and stabbed him to death, while the DIAS policemen did not intervene. One girl asked them to help but they didn’t. They only approached afterwards to arrest the man with the main suspect. Pavlos was taken to Tzanio hospital, where he died shortly afterwards. Before he died, he managed to identify the perpetrator and his accomplices, according to reports'.

 

Monday, October 05, 2009

Greek singer attacked by neo-nazis

A Greek singer is in hospital after being attacked by members of the Golden Dawn neo-nazi party in Athens last week. Sofia Papazoglou (pictured), a popular folk singer of the "entehno" genre known for her progressive politics, was attacked on Thursday 1st of October outside the metro station of Katehaki, in Athens, by ten members of the neo-nazi party Golden Dawn when she threw election leaflets handed to her in the garbage. The singer remains hospitalised with serious burns from use of unidentified acid spray and with impaired vision (more at libcom)

Friday, April 25, 2008

A time to mourn, a time to dance

Is there ever a time when it's not OK to dance? Of course there have always been priests telling people not to dance on sabbaths, but what about dancing at a time of war and misery? My general view is that dancing as the affirmation of life is irrepressible even in the darkest times, but sometimes doesn't defiance become indifference to others' suffering?

There's a bit of a fuss at the moment about an exhibition of photographs of Parisians apparently enjoying themselves under Nazi occupation, including nightclubbing. Was this simple collaboration? Undoubtedly in some cases, although the history of the Zazous - denounced by fascists for defying bans on dancing - suggests that dancing in wartime France was more complex.

But clearly there are times when a line is crossed, and here's an unambiguous example. When the Nazis and their Bulgarian allies occupied Greece they massacred the majority of the country's Jewish population. In the city of Salonica, 95% of Jews were rounded up and deported to death camps, with around 45,000 being killed at Auschwitz. When the few survivors returned to the city in 1945 they found that 'Jewish tombstones were to be found in urinals and driveways, and had been used to make up the dance-floor of a taverna built over a corner of the former cemetery itself'.

Source: Salonica: City of Ghosts - Christians, Muslims and Jews 1430-1950 - Mark Mazower (Lonon, Harper Collins, 2004)