Saturday, November 24, 2012
Greek anti-fascist protesters tortured by police
Greek anti-fascist protesters 'tortured by police' after
Golden Dawn clash
Fifteen people arrested in Athens says they were subjected
to what their lawyer describes as an Abu Ghraib-style humiliation
Fifteen anti-fascist protesters arrested in Athens during a
clash with supporters of the neo-Nazi party Golden Dawn have said they were
tortured in the Attica General Police Directorate (GADA) – the Athens
equivalent of Scotland Yard – and subjected to what their lawyer describes as
an Abu Ghraib-style humiliation.
Members of a second group of 25 who were arrested after
demonstrating in support of their fellow anti-fascists the next day said they
were beaten and made to strip naked and bend over in front of officers and
other protesters inside the same police station.
Several of the protesters arrested after the first
demonstration on Sunday 30 September told the Guardian they were slapped and
hit by a police officer while five or six others watched, were spat on and
"used as ashtrays" because they "stank", and were kept
awake all night with torches and lasers being shone in their eyes.
Some said they were burned on the arms with a cigarette
lighter, and they said police officers videoed them on their mobile phones and
threatened to post the pictures on the internet and give their home addresses
to Golden Dawn, which has a track record of political violence.
Golden Dawn's popularity has surged since the June election,
when it won 18 seats in parliament; it recently came third in several opinion
polls, behind the conservative New Democracy and the leftwing party Syriza.
Last month the Guardian reported that victims of crime have been told by
police officers to seek help from Golden Dawn, who then felt obliged to make
donations to the group.
One of the two women among them said the officers used crude
sexual insults and pulled her head back by the hair when she tried to avoid
being filmed. The protesters said they were denied drinking water and access to
lawyers for 19 hours. "We were so thirsty we drank water from the
toilets," she said.
One man with a bleeding head wound and a broken arm that he
said had been sustained during his arrest alleged the police continued to beat
him in GADA and refused him medical treatment until the next morning. Another
said the police forced his legs apart and kicked him in the testicles during
the arrest.
"They spat on me and said we would die like our grandfathers
in the civil war," he said.
A third said he was hit on the spine with a Taser as he
tried to run away; the burn mark is still visible. "It's like an electric
shock," he said. "My legs were paralysed for a few minutes and I
fell. They handcuffed me behind my back and started hitting and kicking me in
the ribs and the head. Then they told me to stand up, but I couldn't, so they
pulled me up by the chain while standing on my shin. They kept kicking and
punching me for five blocks to the patrol car."
The protesters asked that their names not be published, for
fear of reprisals from the police or Golden Dawn.
A second group of protesters also said they were
"tortured" at GADA. "We all had to go past an officer who made
us strip naked in the corridor, bend over and open our back passage in front of
everyone else who was there," one of them told the Guardian. "He did
whatever he wanted with us – slapped us, hit us, told us not to look at him,
not to sit cross-legged. Other officers who came by did nothing.
"All we could do was look at each other out of the
corners of our eyes to give each other courage. He had us there for more than
two hours. He would take phone calls on his mobile and say, 'I'm at work and
I'm fucking them, I'm fucking them up well'. In the end only four of us were
charged, with resisting arrest. It was a day out of the past, out of the
colonels' junta."
In response to the allegations, Christos Manouras, press
spokesman for the Hellenic police, said: "There was no use of force by
police officers against anyone in GADA. The Greek police examine and
investigate in depth every single report regarding the use of violence by
police officers; if there are any responsibilities arising, the police take the
imposed disciplinary action against the officers responsible. There is no doubt
that the Greek police always respect human rights and don't use violence."
Sunday's protest was called after a Tanzanian community
centre was vandalised by a group of 80-100 people in a central Athens
neighbourhood near Aghios Panteleimon, a stronghold of Golden Dawn where there
have been many violent attacks on immigrants.
According to protesters, about 150 people rode through the
neighbourhood on motorcycles handing out leaflets. They said the front of the
parade encountered two or three men in black Golden Dawn T-shirts, and a fight
broke out. A large number of police immediately swooped on them from the
surrounding streets.
According to Manouras: "During the motorcycle protest
there were clashes between demonstrators and local residents. The police
intervened to prevent the situation from deteriorating and restore public order.
There might have been some minor injuries, during the clashes between
residents, protesters and police."
Marina Daliani, a lawyer for one of the Athens 15, said they
had been charged with "disturbing the peace with covered faces"
(because they were wearing motorcycle helmets), and with grievous bodily harm
against two people. But, she said, no evidence of such harm had so far been
submitted. They have now been released on bail of €3,000 (£2,400) each.
According to Charis Ladis, a lawyer for another of the
protesters, the sustained mistreatment of Greeks in police custody has been
rare until this year: "This case shows that a page has been turned. Until
now there was an assumption that someone who was arrested, even violently,
would be safe in custody. But these young people have all said they lived
through an interminable dark night.
Dimitris Katsaris, a lawyer for four of the protesters, said
his clients had suffered Abu Ghraib-style humiliation, referring to the
detention centre where Iraqi detainees were tortured by US soldiers during the
Iraq war. "This is not just a case of police brutality of the kind you
hear about now and then in every European country. This is happening daily. We
have the pictures, we have the evidence of what happens to people getting
arrested protesting against the rise of the neo-Nazi party in Greece. This is the new face of
the police, with the collaboration of the justice system."
One of the arrested protesters, a quiet man in his 30s
standing by himself, said:
"Journalists here don't report these things. You have
to tell them what's happening here, in this country that suffered so much from
Nazism. No one will pay attention unless you report these things abroad."
Greece: fighting back against the Golden Dawn fascists
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=29890
Greece: fighting back against the Golden Dawn fascists
Nikos Loudos analyses what lies behind the rise of Golden
Dawn, and how the movement against racism and austerity can stop it
The rise of Golden Dawn in Greece has caused shivers across
Europe. It is an openly Nazi organisation that hails Adolf Hitler and the
Holocaust.
Its members systematically murder and wound migrants. They
throw petrol bombs at mosques and say that every woman’s place is at home.
Greece hasn’t become fascist, as some commentators are too
easily concluding. But support for Golden Dawn is growing.
It entered the Greek parliament with almost 7 percent of the
vote in elections this June. It grabbed around 425,000 votes and is the fifth
biggest party in parliament. Opinion polls show that it could become the third
party in the next parliament.
Economic crisis, austerity and cuts are the motor behind
Golden Dawn’s surge. But its rise wasn’t automatic. The racism of the Greek
ruling class and the mainstream parties has opened the way for the Nazis.
As the economic crisis has deepened, Greek governments have
increasingly used racism as a weapon against social movements and the left.
The mainstream parties blame migrants for rising
unemployment, crime and poor services. For them this is a way of deflecting
attention from their own damaging policies.
After a rebellion in December 2008, sparked by the police
murder of a school student, they ramped up the rhetoric. They blamed migrants
and the left for instability in Greece.
Refuge
The political by-product of this was the rise of the far
right party Laos. It didn’t build up fascist street gangs, but several Nazis
found refuge in it.
Greece’s mainstream parties dealt with the rise of Laos by
putting even more racism at the centre of their politics. This didn’t undermine
Laos—it legitimised racism even more.
But as Laos came under pressure to act as a serious
political party, the open Nazis of Golden Dawn were able to present themselves
as “the real thing”.
An important turning point came in late 2011. Laos joined
the “technocrat” government of Lucas Papademos, under pressure from the ruling
class. This was the government that tried to impose austerity after the
Labour-type Pasok government of George Papandreou collapsed.
After that Laos disappeared electorally. This collapse of
the official far right cleared the way for the rise of Golden Dawn.
The collapse of the mainstream parties is critical to
understanding the electoral rise of the Nazis. Pasok used to take more than 40
percent of the vote in every election.
Last June it took 12 percent—and opinion polls predict that
will fall to just 5.5 percent. The Tory-style New Democracy also got its lowest
ever result in June.
Millions of people who had only ever voted for these two
major parties were left floundering. The majority turned to the left, but the
Nazis were also able to capitalise.
Experiment
Their rise hasn’t simply been electoral. The Nazis had
already organised a successful experiment on the streets.
On the square of Aghios Panteleimonas, downtown Athens, they
had started organising through a “citizens committee”. This was nothing more
than Nazis along with racists from the neighbourhood. Its aim was to “cleanse”
the area of migrants.
The official anti-immigrant rhetoric encouraged them. Well
before Golden Dawn became a parliamentary party, Pasok’s public order minister
declared that he could start talks with it over dealing with illegal migrants.
It was well known that Golden Dawn was calling for the
annihilation of migrants. It started organising pogroms, terrorising migrants
and destroying their homes and shops. The media and the government presented
this as a citizens’ action.
The government’s response was to provide more police. But
many cops back Golden Dawn. One in two cops voted for the Nazis in June. Among
riot police the number is even higher.
When anti-fascist demonstrators were arrested recently, they
were tortured in the police headquarters. Police officers told them, “We are
all Golden-Dawners now. You should know it.”
So pogroms began to be organised by police and Golden Dawn.
Police arrested wounded migrants instead of the Nazi gangs.
Just last month police raided two migrants’ homes and
arrested them. A quarter of an hour later, Nazis raided the empty homes to
destroy and steal.
The government’s current response to all of this is to talk
of “the extremes” and to try and demonise the left and workers.
They say that the left, by organising militant demonstrations,
strikes and anti-racist action, is as much to blame for the violence as the
Nazis.
Panic
Greece hasn’t become fascist. But the rise of Golden Dawn
partly reflects the panic of the ruling class. It fears the growing resistance
to, and workers’ strikes against, austerity.
The anti-fascist and anti-racist movement is now at the
forefront of the struggle. The fight against austerity cannot be untangled from
the fight against racism and the Nazis.
Golden Dawn has the official prestige of a parliamentary
party and millions of euros in its coffers coming from the state. But it hasn’t
been able to reproduce its Aghios Panteleimonas experiment.
Its MPs and cadre can’t go anywhere without the cover of the
police. And trade unions, one by one, are voting to stop the fascists in their
workplaces.
Tens of thousands of migrants and others joined an
anti-racist demonstration in August. It proved that the anger is stronger than
the fear.
The newly-organised Movement Against Racism and the Fascist
Threat organised a successful event earlier this month to coordinate action
across Greece.
The slogan, “Fascists, bankers, troika—all you scum work
together” is chanted louder and louder during every strike. The stakes are high
in Greece. The future will depend on whether we can get rid of the scum
altogether.
A history of collaboration and resistance
The far right in Greece has a history of deep cooperation
with the state. The Greek government collaborated with the Nazi forces that
occupied Greece during the Second World War between 1940 and 1944.
It organised paramilitary forces known as the Security Battallions
to suppress anti-Nazi resistance. Greek fascists joined Nazi troops in
encircling working class neighbourhoods. They murdered Communists, Resistance
fighters and their families en masse.
When the Resistance won, most fascists went into hiding. But
they soon became useful to the state again. From 1946 to 1949 civil war raged
in Greece. The Greek government army, backed by British and US troops, fought
the Democratic Army of Greece, part of the Greek Communist Party.
Fascists became useful informers and torturers for the Greek
state in cities and villages across the country. They were rebranded as “Greek
patriots”. Some were even honoured as Resistance fighters.
The fascist networks were kept alive during the 1950s and
existed on the periphery of the police. In 1958 there was a sudden electoral
explosion for the left. Following this, fascists acted as infiltrators and
agent provocateurs in the labour movement.
In 1963 police looked on while a fascist gang murdered an MP
of the United Left, in which the Communist Party was active, during a rally.
A military dictatorship ran Greece between 1967 and 1974. It
outlawed, imprisoned and exiled left wingers. The junta started to crumble
after the Polytechnic Uprising in 1973.
Cleaning
After it collapsed the new labour and student unions
campaigned for the cleaning of fascists from all institutions. The fascists
were on the margins but they didn’t disappear.
Nikos Michaloliakos, the current leader of Golden Dawn, was
convicted in the 1970s for assaults and involvement in putting bombs in a
cinema. He had a very short stay in prison and became an informer for the
secret services.
The fascists became more irrelevant during the 1980s and
Golden Dawn reshaped itself into an openly Nazi organisation.
In the early 1990s the Greek government tried to impose
neoliberal attacks. It began a racist campaign against migrants and a
nationalist campaign against the Republic of Macedonia.
The government and the Orthodox church organised huge
nationalist rallies. They mobilised hundreds of thousands with Greek flags.
The Nazis of Golden Dawn tried to rebrand themselves as
“Greek Orthodox Nationalists”. They took part in the official rallies and
started building branches in some schools.
But the campaign backfired and the government fell. The
anti-racist movement won gains for migrants in the following year and blocked
the fascists.
In 1998 the vice-leader of Golden Dawn, in charge of an
armed gang, attacked and almost killed a student member of the Anticapitalist
Left.
With its vice-leader hiding, Golden Dawn made several
ineffective attempts to get out of the margins in the following years. In 2005
it even announced that it would suspend its own political activities
altogether.
Yet the devastating economic crisis, combined with the
racism of the state, has enabled it to make a comeback.
Ivan Khutorskoy
http://www.theotherrussia.org/2009/11/17/anti-fascist-activist-shot-dead-in-moscow/
November 17th, 2009
A leading anti-fascist activist has been shot and killed in
Moscow, according to reports
by Interfax on November 17.
Ivan Khutorskoy, 26, was found by neighbors in the entryway
to his building on Khabarovskaya ulitsa on the evening of November 16.
Law enforcement agencies say they are investigating several
possible motives for the killing, including connections to the victim’s
anti-fascist activism.
According to the monitoring group Institute of Collective
Action, Khutorskoy had been assaulted three times prior to his murder. In 2005
his head was slashed with a razor, he received multiple wounds around the neck
from a screwdriver and was beaten with a baseball bat during a second incident,
and in 2009 he was stabbed with a knife in the stomach during a street fight.
According to the website, Khutorskoy had recently been
working as security for concerts put on by anti-fascist groups. Colleague
Aleksei Grigoryev said in an interview on Svoboda radio that Khutorskoy had
also frequently worked as security during the press conferences of the
prominent human rights lawyer Stanislav Markelov, who was murdered last
January.
“In general, he was a visible figure for opponents;
apparently this is why the fascists tried so persistently to liquidate him,”
Grigoryev said.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, another colleague told
Reuters that Khutorskoy’s murder was likely political. “Ivan [Khutorskoy] knew
Markelov. His murder was either revenge, or a challenge to the authorities
following the arrests.”
A rise in nationalist sentiments in Russia has contributed
to growing clashes between anti-fascist activists, ultranationalist neo-Nazi
groups, and authorities in recent years. A coalition of ultranationalist groups
distributed instructions on how to acquire firearms at a large rally held during
Russia’s November 4 Unity Day celebrations, while another group held a concert
featuring neo-Nazi performers.
The rise in fascist and ultranationalist extremism has
additionally resulted in increased violence against dark-skinned migrant
workers, as well as a number of recent murders. Stanislav Markelov, a
high-profile lawyer known for his defense of anti-fascists and victims of human
rights abuses, was shot dead in January in central Moscow. One suspect, a
member of neo-Nazi organizations, was detained in early November and has
admitted to the killing. In October 2008, anti-fascist leader Fyodor Filatov
was killed after a fight between anti-fascists and ultranationalists in central
Moscow in which four people were injured.
Armando “Ka Arman” Albarillo
http://www.philippinerevolution.net/publications/ang_bayan/20120707/armando-albarillo-mass-leader-victim-of-fascism-people-s-martyr
Armando Albarillo: Mass leader, victim of fascism, people's
martyr
Armando “Ka Arman” Albarillo was one of 11 Red fighters
killed in a gunbattle with fascist soldiers of the US-Aquino regime on June 30
in San Narciso, Quezon. He was formerly the secretary-general of Bagong
Alyansang Makabayan-Southern Tagalog (BAYAN-ST).
It has been a decade since Ka Arman’s parents Expedito and
Manuela were killed. The military had raided their house in Sitio Ibuye,
Calsapa, San Teodoro, Oriental Mindoro on April 8, 2002. His parents, who were
both members of Bayan Muna were brutally murdered by fascist troops under then
204th Brigade chief Jovito Palparan Jr.
Orphaned, Arman and his younger sister Adeliza were given
sanctuary by church and human rights groups.
It did not take long for Arman to join rallies where he
assailed the Arroyo regime’s inaction not only on his parents’ murders but on
the plight of many other victims of extrajudicial killings, forced
disappearances and other forms of human rights violations. He became a good
organizer of the masses and eventually rose to the position of BAYAN-ST
secretary-general. He was loved and admired by the people and his co-workers
for his militant style of leadership and his determination.
In early 2008, military agents offered him a huge sum of
money in exchange for cooperating with the reactionary government. Ka Arman
flatly refused the offer. He and his wife joined the New People’s Army when
Arman’s name was included in a list of 72 mass leaders and activists of
Southern Tagalog who were slapped with trumped-up criminal charges in 2008.
Ka Arman was killed at the age of 34 amid his continuing
quest for justice for his parents and the oppressed and exploited Filipino
people.
In Athens, murder of a young man from Bangladesh
https://athens.indymedia.org/front.php3?lang=el&article_id=1290570
POGROM IN THE CENTRE OF ATHENS
[…]
In the early morning hours of the 10th May a theft ended up
in the tragic murder of a come-to-be father in the centre of Athens. During the
following hours of the day, the media started reporting about “three dark
skinned suspects”, hence, initiating a propaganda which ended up in a manhunt
by fascists of the extreme right group “golden dawn” on all migrants in the
centre of the city. Around 16 o’clock 100 “inhabitants of the neighbourhood”,
as the media said, protested against the violent death of the “Greek citizen”.
Only some hours later central streets were closed by the police, the
neighbourhood was patrolled by armed officers, while a group of 100 fascists
attacked migrants and refugees at a central square, beating up many of them. A
young men from Bangladesh was so violently stabbed 10 times that he died on the
way to the hospital.
[…]
Fascism, White Nationalism in Ireland
Pro Life Pro Mass Murder? - arrested for protesting fascist
on 'Rally for Life' march
Date: Mon, 2012-07-09
Saturday's Youth Defense march in Belfast saw a WSM member
arrested for protesting the presence of Michael Quinn, the fascist who told the
Sunday World that he would "he would have "no problem" with
an Anders Breivik style-massacre" in Ireland. When Quinn was pointed
out to stewards on the so called 'Rally for Life' they protected him and
allowed him to continue on the march. On Sunday Youth Defence deleted posts of
the picture of Quinn on the demonstration from their Facebook page and banned
people who posted the
picture or demanded to know why they had allowed Quinn to march.
One woman described how "I posted up a picture of
Micheal Quinn from the Belfast rally on the Youth Defence page. One person
replied going something like 'that is a massive generalisation' and before I
could reply, by posting up the youtube of his racist rant my post was removed
and I was banned from posting on their page. They seem to be particularly
sensitive about people revealing Quinn's presence as I had previously posted a
link to the Danish survey on mental health and abortion which was not removed
and is still rumbling away according to my alerts."
A member of Anti-Fascist Action Ireland, who has been
following Michael Quinn's entry into far-right politics since 2010, posted the
same image to the Youth Defence page and was also then banned. "I
wanted to alert their supporters that long-term YD activist Michael Quinn is
now a self-confessed and active White Nationalist and has been building links
with Irish neo-Nazis, formerly of the group Celtic Wolves, and Greek fascists
from Golden Dawn. For my trouble, my post was deleted and I was banned from the
page."
Other people also contacted us to tell us their posts on the
same topic had also been deleted from the page. So what are Youth Defence
trying to hide and what does it tell of the real nature of the 'Rally for
Life'?
Quinn's links with those around Youth Defence go back a long
way. On July
11th 2000 the Independent described him as a member of Youth Defence
after a court appearance with five other Youth Defence members. The others
listed included Justin Barrett and Maurice Colgan. Barrett's link with the far
right have already been broadly exposed in the mainstream press but AFA told us
that "The former National Organiser of Youth Defence, Maurice Colgan,
shared a flat with Anthony Barnes, lead singer of Dublin neo-Nazi bonehead band
‘Celtic Dawn”, in the late 1980s/early 1990s. Colgan was seen at least once, at
a YD leafleting session, wearing a Celtic Dawn t-shirt. His friend Barnes was
later convicted for assault, slicing a political opponents neck with a beer
bottle." (as reported in the Dublin Tribune, Nov 15 1990)
(Read more )
The Sunday World
article revealed that "As the news of the sickening Norwegian
terror attack broke last week, DRM chief Quinn (51) took to the web to
broadcast his sickening support for the murders." The article then
went on to point out that "Fascist Quinn ran for election in Dun
Laoghaire in 1992 as an 'Independent pro-life' candidate but failed to gain
popular support. He went on to become a supporter of Justin Barrett, the
anti-Nice treaty campaigner disgraced over alleged links to European neo-nazis
. Barrett and Quinn were arrested at a violent anti-abortion picket of a Dublin
hospital in 1999 but the charges were later dropped." Another
Sunday World article sub headed "Sick Irish thugs'
recruitment drive with members of racist BNP group" published April
29 2012 revealed that Quinn had previously travelled to Belfast to meet with
the far right British National Party and loyalists.
There was also controversy over Quinn's presence on
last years anti-choice march in Dublin - in short there is no excuse for
claiming not to know who and what he is. Quinn is certainly a nut, but after
the Breivik massacre in which 76 people were killed, many of them teenagers,
nuts cannot be simply dismissed as harmless. The fact that Quinn was not only
tolerated but protected by stewards exposes the lie that is the entire
'Pro-Life' label. Those on the pro-choice counter rally were chanting"Pro
Life, that's a lie, they don't care of women die" as the march
passed. The continued toleration and protection of Quinn reveal that the
fundamental truth of that slogan is much deeper than many of those chanting it
probably realized. (Watch
a copy of Quinn's post massacre youtube video)
The "Rally for Life' was otherwise the standard march
of the religious far right determined to continue the regime which makes it possible
to criminalize Irish women and doctors. The organizers pulled their usual
branding routine of having young women carry the front banner but apart from
this banner and a couple of other 'created to be photographed' clumps the march
was overwhelmingly composed of religious fundamentalists, men, women over 50
and young children. In other words almost no one on the march was someone who
might find themselves pregnant in the near future yet all were determined that
a women with a crisis pregnancy should not be allowed to decide themselves
whether or not to continue with it. Many of those marching thrust rosary
beads into the faces of those on the counter protest or waved religious
placards. Many of the older men were either wearing priests collars or were
wearing the standard priest black shirt with the collar removed. (Facebook
album of photos from the march).
The anti-choice march seemed quite a bit smaller than last
years march, despite the massive amount spent promoting it and running coaches
to it from all over the island. On the other hand the 'organised on a
shoestring' counter rally had grown in numbers in comparison with that last
year with as many as 300 taking part.
Those attending included a coach load of pro-choice
campaigners from Dublin who had been moved to action by the shocking
Youth Defence billboard campaign aimed at traumatizing the tens of
thousands of Irish women who have had abortions abroad. As we previously
reported women outraged at these bill boards have torn many of them down,
splashed them with paint or covered them with counter slogans.
All this in the context in the south where the Labour Party
seems so scared of Youth Defence that rather than legislate for abortion in the
very limited circumstances of the
X-Case judgement they voted down a Dail bill to do just this and are
hiding behind seeking a report from yet another committee. This 20 years after
the X-case and after all previous governments have either tried and failed to
overturn this judgment in referenda or also hidden behind getting reports from
committees. This pathetic situation has gone on far too long, every day women
are forced to make the difficult and often expensive trip aboard for an
abortion or risk using medication ordered off the internet to self-induce an
abortion at home.
Youth Defence have been crowing about their success in
stopping legislation being passed under the weird '100,000 babies saved'
slogan. Weird because in reality about that number of women in Ireland have
obtained an abortion since 1992 through travel or self inducement. Women have
not been prevented exercising choice by Youth Defence, its just been made much
more difficult for them. It's time Youth Defence were stood up to, their
constant campaigns of shaming and traumatizing women ended and abortion made
available, free and on demand as part of the Irish health services north and
south.
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