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AFP - Police said Saturday they had rounded up about 2,000 people in an operation to evict undocumented immigrants from central Athens, claiming that "national survival" was at stake for debt-choked Greece.
The aim of the operation was "to send them back to their countries of origin, close the borders and ensure that Athens returns to being a lawful city with a quality of life," police spokesman Christos Manouras said.
Operation Xenios Zeus, named after the name of the king of the ancient Greek gods in his role as protector of guests, mobilised 2,000 police in Athens and another 2,500 on Greece's eastern border with Turkey.
Manouras said the deportation of illegal immigrants was a necessity for national survival.
"We must send the message that Greece cannot afford work and hospitality" to would-be immigrants, he said.
http://www.france24.com/en/20120804-greek-police-evict-immigrants-athens
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Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)I remember a story that the police had high levels of fascist voters in the last elections. But do they have the authority to just round people up like that, all in a mass? Not only is it inhumane, it's going to have political implications.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)The countries where they are from are going to have trouble absorbing a large spike. I know the humanitarian aspect holds no interest for you, but the logistics of it might give you pause.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Greece's population is only 11.3 million.
The population of Pakistan, for example, is 176 million. So the home countries of the immigrants are arguably better able to absorb them than is Greece.
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)They prefer the cuisine? Please.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Once in Greece, they can attempt to travel on to another EU country.
HiPointDem
(20,729 posts)
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)but I fear so many others do not see the intent and the message behind the round up of "undesireables".
Slippery slippery slope.
Esp. since ..."For the first time in Greek political history, the country in June voted into parliament a neo-Nazi party, Golden Dawn, which has promised to purge the country of illegal migrants."
Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)Greece has had immigrants going to and fro for decades. Germany is putting the pressure on Greece to "stem the tide"--I find the historical parallels incredibly alarming.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/06/19/golden-dawn-s-violent-war-against-immigrants-in-greece.html
Being an immigrant—illegal or not—has become a risky way of life in Athens. Since May 6, when Greeks gave voice to extremist neo-Nazi anti-immigration party Golden Dawn, attacks on immigrants have doubled. On May 31, an Albanian man standing on the street in Athens’s Neos Kosmos neighborhood was stabbed with a sword by a masked motorcycle driver. Paramedics had to remove several ribs to dislodge the sword, which pierced his chest and was left sticking out of his back.
The same night, 20 minutes later, two Polish men were stabbed with knives in the same part of town. The next day men from Bangladesh and Pakistan were stabbed in the city’s subway stations. “Things have gotten worse since the elections,” Reza Gholami, who heads an association for immigrants from Afghanistan, told Greek Kathimerini newspaper after the May 6 election. “There are daily beatings.”
I'd say the "problem" is scary neo-nazis gaining power, not immigrants who are contributing to the economy:
http://www.migrationinformation.org/Profiles/display.cfm?ID=884
More than 1 million immigrants have arrived in Greece over the course of two decades, contributing significantly to the improvement of the demographic and economic profile of the country.
The numbers of immigrants have actually been going down in recent years:
It has widely been reported that the current economic crisis in Greece and growing xenophobia among the citizen population have reduced immigrant registration. The number of registered foreign born has fallen in the past three years, from 602,797 in 2009 to 553,916 in 2010 to 447,658 in 2011.
The business of ferrying immigrants into Greece is big business in the countries of origin, just like it is here. Therefore, people are not going to stop profiting on people trying to get to better jobs in Europe. So what message is this intended to send?
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)One quick google gives stories of international immigrant crackdowns:
here in US,,"Operation Safe Communitites" is the plan's name
and in Israel, in China,in Britain,
in France ( they are after the Romany gypsies, who have been persecuted for ages, the Nazis killed a lot of them)
Besides Greece and the above, I have not yet heard of other countries.
Rather interesting that this has suddenly become a global issue.
HiPointDem
(20,729 posts)to hold down wages in booms (wink wink nod nod) now do a 180 & start using them as scapegoats, suddenly 'cracking down' like they just caught the clue train.
and yes, fascism goes with that scenario.
emilyg
(22,742 posts)and have very little sympathy for the illegals.
pampango
(24,692 posts)seem to have sympathy for Golden Dawn.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_Dawn_(Greece)
The party ran a campaign during the Greek national elections of 2012 based on concerns for unemployment, austerity and the economy, as well as virulent anti-immigration rhetoric, which gained a large increase in support from the general public.
In the elections of May 2012, the exit polls conducted showed that in the large urban regions of Greece (mainly Athens, and also Thessaloniki) on average 50% of the members of the various police divisions (increasingly towards the special task and anti-riot units) declared having voted for Golden Dawn. The city's electoral districts where policemen voted registered the highest scores for the party, culminating at 19-24%, showing a high contrast with neighboring districts.
Members of Golden Dawn have been accused of carrying out acts of violence and hate crimes against immigrants, political opponents and ethnic minorities. Golden Dawn's offices have been attacked many times by anarchists and leftists. Clashes between members of Golden Dawn and leftists have not been unusual.
Golden Dawn's Youth Front has distributed fliers with nationalist messages in Athens schools and organised the concert series Rock Against Communism. It publishes the white nationalist magazine Resistance Hellas-Antepithesi. The magazine is a sister publication of the United States-based National Alliance's Resistance magazine. The collaboration between Greek nationalists and American racialists began in 2001, after National Alliance founder William Luther Pierce visited Thessaloniki, Greece.
In the May 2012 Greek elections, Golden Dawn ran under the slogan "So we can rid this land of filth".
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Rarely could charity have had such negative connotations as on Wednesday in Syntagma Square, central Athens, where neofascist Chryssi Avgi (Golden Dawn) handed out free food to passers-by, as long as they could prove they were Greek.
The party, which gained 7 percent of the vote in the June elections, was completely open about the fact that it had taken a political choice to feed just Greeks. The sociopathic nature of this decision is self-evident. The fact that the event was a bare-faced publicity stunt is also clear. Golden Dawn's decision to use state funding (taxpayers’ money) for “good causes” is a direct challenge to the parties accused of consistently pocketing or wasting public funds. It underlines that Golden Dawn is a product of the political system’s chronic apathy.
It is too late to correct this now, the damage has been done. Cleaning up the political system and completing the transition from the self-serving politics of the last few decades to something more productive will take time. But this is a commodity Greece doesn’t have when dealing with the rise of extremism. Wednesday’s events highlighted that the country is fast approaching social disintegration.
The discrimination exercised in how food was handed out or the fact that Golden Dawn defied a ban by the City of Athens to use the capital’s main square for its event is the least of Greek society’s worries. There was something much darker, more malignant going in Syntagma Square. Anyone wanting to avail themselves of the far-right party’s “generosity” was asked to produce an ID card proving they were Greek. This document was then taken by party members, who recorded all the details.
http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite3_1_02/08/2012_455135
Things are likely to get worse after Greece is kicked out of the Eurozone. Standard of living will probably fall by half.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)Starry Messenger
(32,342 posts)<snip>
“Despite clear patterns to the violence and evidence that it is increasing, the police have failed to respond effectively to protect victims and hold perpetrators to account,” says the report. “Authorities have yet to develop a preventive policing strategy, while victims are discouraged from filing official complaints. No one has been convicted under Greece’s 2008 hate crime statute.”
Human Rights Watch accuses the police of being ill-equipped or ill-disposed to investigate reports of racist violence. “There is no specialized, practical training at the police academies, and there are no specialized officers tasked with pursuing or overseeing investigations into possible hate crimes. While responders will provide immediate assistance – calling an ambulance, for example – Human Rights Watch heard repeatedly that police discourage victims from filing official complaints.”
Making an already bad situation worse, Greece introduced a 100-euro fee to file police complaints in 2010. Designed to discourage frivolous complaints that clog a chronically slow system of justice, the fee is also preventing migrants from filing complaints.
<snip>
Sunderland interviewed 79 foreigners living in Greece. The majority (59) said they experienced or escaped a xenophobic incident in Greece between August 2009 and May 2012.
The victims included migrants and asylum seekers, as well as two pregnant women.
This is a rising political campaign of terror. It's not going to stop with immigrants, who are an "easy" target to scapegoat. Fascists control whole neighborhoods with the winking encouragement of police. They have a political base and are training shock troops to control populations. This frightens me.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/fascism-rises-from-the-depths-of-greeces-despair-7712276.html
It started, as many days do in Greece, with a trip to the kiosk to buy cigarettes. Still half-asleep, Panayiotis Roumeliotis was surprised to be asked to show his identity card by two young men with shaved heads. It was his first direct contact with the vigilante groups that have become a feature of everyday life in some areas of the Greek capital.
"They were calling themselves the residents association but they were just fasistakia (little fascists)," said the 28-year-old.
Over the last two years, Mr Roumeliotis has watched the central Athens neighbourhood of Ayios Panteleimonas, where he grew up, undergo an ugly transformation. Taking the bus on another morning soon after, a gunshot shattered the back window and a gang of men forced the driver to stop. When the doors opened, they came on to the bus and started to assault the non-Greek passengers. The attackers were wearing T-shirts from the right-wing extremist group Golden Dawn. While panicked people were trying to escape from the bus the men were hitting them with flagpoles.
"They were beating people with the Greek flag," said Mr Roumeliotis.
When the police arrived they stood off until the thugs had finished. When he asked the police why no one had been arrested one of the officers replied to him: "Why, did they do something to you?"
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)This is the way the fascists start. With the MOST disenfranchised and hated of the population. Then they move on to their next enemy. That would be you Greek Reds. You either defend these immigrants and yourselves or you lose without firing a shot.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)If you're xenophobic, you ain't a socialist.
Chris Jones
(1 post)Refugees: Picking the Grapes or Getting Swept Up
Samos Diary 11
The grape harvest is now underway on Samos island. The vinyards on the lower slopes are now being picked and this will continue through to the end of September as the grapes mature higher up the mountain. The mountainous terrain of Samos is such that both the major crops of grapes and olives cannot be cultivated or harvested by any significant mechanical assistance. Human labour alone, as it has been for hundreds of years, is the only way to farm on most of the island.
The harvest itself is hard physical work and for many involves carrying 20 kg crates of grapes up and down mountain slopes to the pick up vehicles that will take them off to be pressed. The crates we use are plastic and alongside the pick up truck these are probably the main differences between the harvest of today and that of 200 hundred years earlier.
The hard work is made more difficult by the summer temperatures currently in the low to mid 30’s. Even though we start picking as soon as it is light, within 2 hours the sun is ferocious.
On a number of the vineyards you will see large family groups ranging from children to grandparents bringing in the grapes. Women far outnumber the men in many of these groups and this transforms the process such as on our neighbour’s vineyard where the picking is accompanied by much banter, jokes and singing amongst the women.
But this is no longer the way in which most of the grapes are harvested. As the young have migrated away from the island over many decades the average age of the Samos farmer has grown to over 60 years. The young who do stay are not generally interested in working the land, even if they might lend a hand in the harvest.
This has had many consequences, not the least being the gradual abandonment of vinyards and olive orchards, especially where access is difficult. Untended they quickly revert to a ‘jungle’ of weeds and shrubs, which in turn heightens the fire risk during the summer – a major threat every year. One of the reasons why the fires in 2000 devastated about a third of Samos was due to the neglect of the land which allowed grasses to flourish which by August made for the most inflammable hay.
The island is littered with abandoned terraces. Using the bountiful supply of stone previous generations of farmers covered the island’s mountain slopes with terracing for olives and grapes. Any walk in the mountains reveals the remnants of this extraordinary achievement, with sections of the dry stone terraces still standing amongst the trees and shrub. This is by no means unique to Samos but is true for much of rural Greece especially where the terrain does not permit the use of tractors and other farm machinery.
However, over the past 2 decades the rate of abandonment has undoubtedly been slowed down, first by the arrival of the Albanian exodus through the 1990s and more recently by refugees. If it were not for these sources of mainly young, highly vulnerable and therefore cheap labour many more farms would be abandoned, and certainly in the case of Samos, most of the olives and grapes would be left unpicked. So one of the most significant differences between the grape harvest of today compared with earlier times is not only the presence of pick up trucks as against donkeys and plastic crates instead of wicker panniers, but above all the background of the pickers. Family groups are now far outnumbered by migrants and refugees on the vinyards.
All over rural Greece, refugees and migrants are doing (hard, physical) work without which many villages would simply not survive. Their role and contribution is crucial as my drive from the coast to the village this morning revealed as I passed African and Pakistani workers collecting the grapes.
But in Athens at the very same time the Greek state has launched and is continuing its biggest ever police mobilisation against refugees and migrant workers. The progrom, for this is what is happening, has been named by the state as Operation Xenios Zeus which in itself reveals the utter cruelty and contempt of the state for these most vulnerable of the population. For Zeus is the god of hospitality and the protector of guests! Under this benign name 2,000 police have been deployed in Athens and 2,500 police on Greece’s eastern border with Turkey. On Saturday 4th August in Athens alone, over 1,100 refugees without appropriate papers were arrested and detained and a further 4,900 held temporarily for questioning. These numbers have grown as the sweep operation continues (see http://clandestinenglish.wordpress.com/2012/08/05/operation-xenios-zeus-in-athens/).
Empty, or under-utilised military camps in the north of Greece have been commandeered to house those detained pending their eventual deportation as well as a new detention centre in Athens. Moreover, in their characteristically authoritarian fashion, the police action is indiscriminate and inhumane. No distinction is made between the majority who have the appropriate papers and those who do not; the main criteria for being swept up seems to be skin colour; no account is given to minors, to those traumatized by their flight and escapes, to those who have been tortured and raped. All this is now well documented as being the norm for the Greek state in numerous reports coming out of Amnesty, Human Rights Watch and many other national and international NGOs ( a recent example being Human Rights Watch’s July 2012 report ‘Hate on the Streets’ (http://www.hrw.org/reports/2012/07/10/hate-streets). But on the ground it is not that nothing changes but it gets worse almost day by day.
The emergence of Golden Dawn following the June general elections adds impetus to the fascistic tendencies of the state. The New Democracy led coalition is desperate to avoid haemorrhaging its right wing support to this populist and openly fascistic party which now has state funding following its success in gaining a presence in the Greek parliament. This is turn has allowed it to gain wide coverage for its racist stunts like giving out food to the poor in Syntagma Square with the vicious condition that they must possess a Greek I.D. The dynamic on the right is like watching a dance of death evolve and grow. If nothing else it ignites the most massive ‘green light’ to a Greek police force half of whom it has been estimated voted for Golden Dawn. It is a green light for violence, cruelty, and neglect all with impunity.
There is no subtlety involved. The Greek government with extreme disregard for the truth is seeking to persuade that the real and most pressing crisis facing Greece is not the ‘debt’ or the Troika but illegal immigration to the country. “Two days after a massive sweep operation in which Greek police netted over 1,000 clandestine immigrants in central Athens, Public Order and Citizens' Protection Minister Nikos Dendias defended the campaign saying failure to crack down on illegal immigration would lead to social ‘collapse’. “Our social fabric is in danger of unraveling. The immigration problem is perhaps even bigger than the financial one,” Dendias told Skai radio on Monday.He said the “invasion of immigrants” was the biggest Greece has faced since the invasion of the Dorians….” (Ekathimerini, August 7th 2012).
Many people here are shocked and frightened by these developments. The current progrom heightens these fears, despite active resistance on the streets from both the communist party (KKE) and the left social democratic, Syriza. But it is the small developments that are perhaps more insidious and reveal a more fundamental process of normalizing xenophobic nationalism with its attendant racism. Greece and Greek are increasingly being used as adjectives in much the same way as in the early days of Hitler, when fascist supporters took to talking about German this or that as a means of indicating that they were not Jewish. Same here, being Greek now also means not being a refugee or migrant or anything remotely associated with the so-called sub-humans who have no place in the cradle of western civilisation. As one commentator noted, the very name of the latest progrom ‘Xenios Zeus’ is an appeal to classical authority, part of an attempt to assert a perceived difference between ‘western civilisation’ and ‘oriental barbarity’ going all the way back to Ancient Greece. According to the public order minister, Nikos Dendias, “the country is being lost. Not since the coming of the Dorians, 4000 years ago, has the country seen an invasion of such scale… This is a bomb at the foundations of society and of the state.” (Yannis Hamilakis, August 8th 2012; http://greekleftreview.wordpress.com/2012/08/08/hospitable-zeus/)
As these terrible events unfold in Greece I am also reading that the recently elected ‘socialist’ government in France is launching an unprecedented attack on the Roma population in France. As with operation Scoupa earlier this year in Athens the French are justifying their action on the grounds that the Roma pose a severe threat to public health. Of course health is threatened when states deny people any benefits, decent housing, jobs, respect and basically herd them into ghettoes of neglect and abandonment. This is where the health threat comes from and not from its victims. But with the right adjectives – not least being called illegal – and with the right skin colour - state after state from the USA, to Israel through to Greece are trying to reinforce an unquestioning association between refugees/migrants and danger and threat.
We simply cannot afford to stand back and allow capitalist states in the midst of its most serious and enduring systemic crisis to continue along this trajectory. It is, to use an inelegant phrase, ‘frightening as hell’.
Published on ZNet. See: http://www.zcommunications.org/zspace/Chris%20Jones