Anarchism in Greece - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Anarchists in Greece

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

have emerged from occasionally overlapping but mostly diverse inclinations. It is often difficult to trace the connections of the various anarchist leagues and affinity group

Affinity group

An Affinity group is usually a small group of activists who work together on direct action.Affinity groups are organized in a non-hierarchical manner, usually using consensus decision making, and are often made up of trusted friends...

s, as they remained mostly underground.

History

1860-1875

The first libertarian texts were published in Greece in 1860 and some organized anarchist action started in Athens

Athens

Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

around the same time. Much was written and published by anarchists and libertarian radicals of that time, deeply influenced by the activities of similar European movements. Emmanouel Dadaoglou, a merchant from Smyrna, had probably come across anarchist ideas after meeting Italian political refugees, who first arrived in Patras in 1849 due to the War of the Two Sicilies. Together with Italian anarchist Amilcare Cipriani

Amilcare Cipriani

Amilcare Cipriani was an Italian anarchist patriot.Cipriani was born in Anzio to a family originally from Rimini...

, founder of the "Democrats Club", they organized a group and took part in the revolution against Otto of Greece

Otto of Greece

Otto, Prince of Bavaria, then Othon, King of Greece was made the first modern King of Greece in 1832 under the Convention of London, whereby Greece became a new independent kingdom under the protection of the Great Powers .The second son of the philhellene King Ludwig I of Bavaria, Otto ascended...

in 1862. They put up a barricade near Kapnikarea in Athens. From 1864 to 1867 Dadaoglou went to Italy in the area of Napoli where he became a member of the International Workingmen's Association

International Workingmen's Association

The International Workingmen's Association , sometimes called the First International, was an international organization which aimed at uniting a variety of different left-wing socialist, communist and anarchist political groups and trade union organizations that were based on the working class...

(IWA), following the ideas of Mikhail Bakunin

Mikhail Bakunin

Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin was a well-known Russian revolutionary and theorist of collectivist anarchism. He has also often been called the father of anarchist theory in general. Bakunin grew up near Moscow, where he moved to study philosophy and began to read the French Encyclopedists,...

. At that time he met Maria Pantazi

Maria Pantazi

Maria Pantazi was a Greek anarchist and partner of Emanouil Dadaoglou.She met Dadaoglou in the 1860s when the latter was living in Napoli and where she was working as a prostitute. They moved in together. After the death of Dadaoglou, she moved to Paris. There she became a member of an "armed"...

, a former prostitute, who became his lifelong companion. In the late 1860s he returned to Greece, where he died in 1870. After his death, Maria Pantazi left Greece and died in the aftermath of the Paris Commune

Paris Commune

The Paris Commune was a government that briefly ruled Paris from March 18 to May 28, 1871. It existed before the split between anarchists and Marxists had taken place, and it is hailed by both groups as the first assumption of power by the working class during the Industrial Revolution...

, at the hands of the Royal Guards, in 1872. The first anarchist publication in Greece appeared on 3 September 1861, in the daily newspaper "" (Light), issue 334. It's the main article of the paper, titled "Anarchy", part A, by an anonymous writer. All the copies were confiscated a few hours after their release and a police raid was staged, forcing the owner of the paper to condemn the article, so part B was never published. Libertarian movements also occurred in the Ionian Islands, with the names of Mikelis Avlichos

Mikelis Avlichos

Mikelis Avlichos was a Greek poet and scholar.He was born in Lixouri, Kefalonia. He remained in Lixouri until his graduation from the Petritsio high school and then completed his philosophical and philological education in Berne, Switzerland and other centres of Europe.In his early years he was...

and Nikos Konemenos saved for us. Avlichos studied in Bern, Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

were he met Michail Bakunin, and afterwards he returned to Cefalonia, his birthplace. He published some articles. Konemenos, living in Corfu

Corfu

Corfu is a Greek island in the Ionian Sea. It is the second largest of the Ionian Islands, and, including its small satellite islands, forms the edge of the northwestern frontier of Greece. The island is part of the Corfu regional unit, and is administered as a single municipality. The...

, was one of the first to use the term "communism" and one of the first to speak for women's rights. In 1893 he published a book in Italian called Ladri ed omicidi (Thieves and murderers).

1876-1914

The seeds sown during the previous decade flowered, producing revolutionary organizations in many parts of Greece, such as Athens, Syros, Messinia, Aegio, Filiatra, Cefalonia and Patras. Yannis Kordatos, in his "Comprehensive History of Greece", writes: "The anarcho-socialist ideas found ground to spread in Patras in my opinion, due to the presence of 5,000 proletarians, the proximity with the Ionian Islands and their radicals and the good communications of the city with Europe." Anarchists in Patras formed a collective called "Democratic Association" in 1876, which, because of the city's favorable position and its port, acquired close and constant relations not only with fellow anarchists from nearby Italy but with other European organizations. They tried to coordinate all the groups in Greece and to form the first Greek Chapter of the International Workers Association. A league called "Democratic League of the People" was formed and in an article in the Italian paper Il Martello published in Bologna

Bologna

Bologna is the capital city of Emilia-Romagna, in the Po Valley of Northern Italy. The city lies between the Po River and the Apennine Mountains, more specifically, between the Reno River and the Savena River. Bologna is a lively and cosmopolitan Italian college city, with spectacular history,...

, Italy, was an announcement of the league's existence: "...later on we will send you the general policies of the Democratic League of the People and the specific policies of the Company of Patras... Soon enough we will publish our socialist newspaper as an instrument of IWA ...". The following repression from the Greek state was in accord with a European state agreement, a fact that can be proved from several diplomatic papers. In the newspaper Bulletin of the Jura federation
Jura federation
The Jura Federation was the federalist and anarchist section of the International Workingmen's Association , based largely among watch-makers in the Jura mountain range in Switzerland. The Jura federation was founded on October 9, 1870 at a meeting in Saint-Imier of local sections of the IWA...

on 10 June 1877: "Greece in its turn joins the agreement of civilized nations, those who are sleepless in taking measures of pressure in keeping the social order".In 1896, two new associations are established: One in Patras

Patras

Patras , ) is Greece's third largest urban area and the regional capital of West Greece, located in northern Peloponnese, 215 kilometers west of Athens...

and the other in Pyrgos. The most active members were D. Badounas, D. Arnellos, D. Karabizas and the poet P. Tsekouras. They translated various anarchist articles and later the same year they published the anarchist newspaper Epi ta proso
Epi ta proso
thumb|right|Frontpage of Epi ta Proso.Epi ta Proso was a newspaper published in Patras in 1882 by A. Eymorfopoulos . In 1896, the paper changed ownership to the hands of the Free Socialists a group of anarchists, one of the many that existed in Patras...

("Forward") with Anarcho-socialist inclinations around which gathered Anarcho-Christians

Christian anarchism

Christian anarchism is a movement in political theology that combines anarchism and Christianity. It is the belief that there is only one source of authority to which Christians are ultimately answerable, the authority of God as embodied in the teachings of Jesus...

, Anarcho-communists

Anarchist communism

Anarchist communism is a theory of anarchism which advocates the abolition of the state, markets, money, private property, and capitalism in favor of common ownership of the means of production, direct democracy and a horizontal network of voluntary associations and workers' councils with...

, Socialists

Socialism

Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

, and even Individualists

Individualist anarchism

Individualist anarchism refers to several traditions of thought within the anarchist movement that emphasize the individual and his or her will over external determinants such as groups, society, traditions, and ideological systems. Individualist anarchism is not a single philosophy but refers to a...

. At the turn of the 20th century most of the urban centers in the country had an Anarchist nucleus. At the same time anarchist Marinos Antypas

Marinos Antypas

Marinos Antypas was a Greek lawyer and journalist, and one of the country's first socialists.He was born in the village Ferentinata, near Antypata Pylarou, in Kefalonia, the eldest son of Spiros Antypas and Angelin Klada...

, a legendary hero of the peasants' movement, was active in different parts of Greece. In 1913, Anarchist Alexandros Schinas

Alexandros Schinas

Alexandros Schinas , was a Greek anarchist who assassinated King George I of Greece in Thessaloniki in 1913....

shot and killed King George of Greece in Thessaloniki. He was tortured and murdered six weeks later.

1915-1949

Many Anarchists participated in the socialist Federacion of Saloniki and later in the Socialist Worker's Party of Greece, which was to become the Communist Party of Greece (CPG) in 1923, and which slowly absorbed most of the Greek revolutionaries. Many other Anarchists were active in local workers' struggles that flared up in the 20s and 30s. Notable examples were Constantinos Speras

Constantinos Speras

Constantinos Speras was a Greek anarcho-syndicalist, and one of the pioneers of the working class trade-union movement in Greece. He spent the biggest part of his life in prison and in exile, totalling 109 times...

, anarchosyndicalist and leader of the strike of Serifos

Serifos

Serifos is a Greek island municipality in the Aegean Sea, located in the western Cyclades, south of Kythnos and northwest of Sifnos. It is part of the Milos peripheral unit. The area is 75.207 km² and the population was 1,414 at the 2001 census. It is located about ESE of Piraeus...

(murdered by CPG thugs in 1944) and Yannis Tamtakos

Yannis Tamtakos

Yannis Tamtakos was a political activist, of trotskyism at first, and of anarchism, later on. He lived and remained politically active in Greece. Due to his political activity, he was chased by the state and stalinists...

, one of the leaders of the general strike of 1936 in Thessaloniki

Thessaloniki

Thessaloniki , historically also known as Thessalonica, Salonika or Salonica, is the second-largest city in Greece and the capital of the region of Central Macedonia as well as the capital of the Decentralized Administration of Macedonia and Thrace...

. During the dictatorship of Metaxas (1936–1940) and the occupation of the country by the Nazis (1941–1944) the repression of the working class and its revolutionary element reached its peak. Thousands died in the war, in exile, in jails, and in concentration camps. Meanwhile, the Communist (Stalinist) Party (CPG) was gaining enormous power in the country, thanks to its revisionist policy of "National Resistance" against the German Army. In December, 1944, two months after the end of the Occupation, the CPG staged an "uprising" in Athens against the re-emerging pre-war regime and its British allies. During the three weeks of fighting, Communist Party hit squads eliminated many Anarchists, trotskyites and dissident members of their own party along with other "class enemies", before they left the city in the hands of the British army. The "civil war" that followed until 1949 ended with the defeat of the Communist Party and the ruthless suppression of all revolutionary activity.

1950-1968

In the repression that followed what the government had called a "Communist Insurrection" (1944–1949), many Anarchists were persecuted, exiled, and jailed along with sympathisers of the banned Greek Communist Party (GCP), as a threat to Cold War order. Many died and more emigrated to America, Australia, and North Europe. Until the middle of the 1960s Anarchism remained alive only because of a handful of libertarian poets and writers (mostly in exile). The main struggle was between the colonial reactionary government and the "democratic left", supported by the CPG.

1969 to 1981

The new phase of the Greek anarchist movement started during the dictatorship of the Greek military junta of 1967-1974

Greek military junta of 1967-1974

The Greek military junta of 1967–1974, alternatively "The Regime of the Colonels" , or in Greece "The Junta", and "The Seven Years" are terms used to refer to a series of right-wing military governments that ruled Greece from 1967 to 1974...

. Students returning from Paris, where they had taken part in the events of May, 1968, and got in contact with leftist and anarchist ideas, started spreading these ideas among the radical youth of the time. In 1972, Guy Debord's "The Society of the Spectacle" was published, along with other Situationist texts. Mikhail Bakunin's God and the State
God and the State
God and the State is the best-known literary work of Russian anarchist, Mikhail Bakunin.-Composition:God and the State was written between February and March 1871. It was originally written as Part II of a greater work that was going to be called The Knouto-Germanic Empire and the Social Revolution...

and Peter Kropotkin

Peter Kropotkin

Prince Pyotr Alexeyevich Kropotkin was a Russian zoologist, evolutionary theorist, philosopher, economist, geographer, author and one of the world's foremost anarcho-communists. Kropotkin advocated a communist society free from central government and based on voluntary associations between...

's Law and Authority followed. "Black Rose" bookshop carried these publications of "Diethnis Vivliothiki" ("International Library"), which went on to publish books by Rosa Luxemburg

Rosa Luxemburg

Rosa Luxemburg was a Marxist theorist, philosopher, economist and activist of Polish Jewish descent who became a naturalized German citizen...

, Ida Mett

Ida Mett

Ida Mett was a Russian-born anarchist and author....

, Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau

Henry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, and leading transcendentalist...

, Murray Bookchin

Murray Bookchin

Murray Bookchin was an American libertarian socialist author, orator, and philosopher. A pioneer in the ecology movement, Bookchin was the founder of the social ecology movement within anarchist, libertarian socialist and ecological thought. He was the author of two dozen books on politics,...

, Max Nettlau

Max Nettlau

Max Heinrich Hermann Reinhardt Nettlau was a German anarchist and historian. Although born in Neuwaldegg and raised in Vienna he retained his Prussian nationality throughout his life. A student of the Welsh language he spent time in London where he joined the Socialist League where he met...

, Jerry Rubin

Jerry Rubin

Jerry Rubin was an American social activist during the 1960s and 1970s. During the 1980s, he became a successful businessman.-Early life:...

, and many others. In 1973, "Electoral Strike", a translation of a 1902 text against voting in bourgeois elections was published, as an answer to the junta's "democratization process" and planned elections. Anarchists were among the main actors in the student movement against the junta. Greek anarchists in the light of May of '68 and the Italian autonomist movement opposed Anarcho-syndicalism

Anarcho-syndicalism

Anarcho-syndicalism is a branch of anarchism which focuses on the labour movement. The word syndicalism comes from the French word syndicat which means trade union , from the Latin word syndicus which in turn comes from the Greek word σύνδικος which means caretaker of an issue...

in favor of direct class war

Class conflict

Class conflict is the tension or antagonism which exists in society due to competing socioeconomic interests between people of different classes....

. Their influences were the classics (Bakunin, Kropotkin) but also the Situationist International and autonomist Marxism. They came mostly from communist backgrounds, disillusioned with the reformism of "Communist" parties worldwide. They were against fascism, capitalism, imperialism, bureaucracy, racism, sexism and any kind of authority - especially that of the Communist Party (GCP), which was projecting itself as the sole authority on revolutionary truth. The turning point came during the student uprising against the junta at the Polytechnic School in Athens in November, 1973. Anarchists sprayed "Down with the State" and "Down with the Capital" on the front gate of the Polytechnic, took part in the first occupation committee, put up barricades in the surrounding streets, and fought battles with police and army for three days. On the night of 17 November the army moved into the Polytechnic, ending the occupation and killing dozens in the process. Seven months later, the junta collapsed and a new, "democratic" government was sworn in under right-winger K. Karamanlis. In September, 1974, left-wing organisations (including the GCP) were legalized again after 25 years. This led to an explosion of Maoist, Trotskyist and Guevarist groups, which together with the Anarchists were at the left of the GCP. After 1976, another libertarian publisher appeared, "Eleytheros Typos" ("Free Press"), popularising Anarcho-communism, the Spanish Revolution

Spanish Revolution

The Spanish Revolution was a workers' social revolution that began during the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936 and resulted in the widespread implementation of anarchist and more broadly libertarian socialist organizational principles throughout various portions of the country for two to...

, and dissident movements from around the world.

The movement strengthened in the late 70s, when many people left the Communist Party and a host of Maoist and Trotskyist groups (who were strong in the mid-70s) and found themselves on the side of autonomists and anarchists. Rock music and hippie culture had a strong impact. The university occupation movement of 1979-1981 was largely instigated by Anarchist and leftist groups. Near the Polytechnic, the student neighborhood of Exarchia became a "free zone", where leftists, Anarchists, hippies, and others were in charge. In the riots of May, 1976, masked Anarchists attacked the police and public buildings, fighting on the side of thousands of workers and students. That led to arrests and the first "anti-terror" legislation. By 1980, the government's "anti-terrorist" campaign and the orchestrated heroin epidemic had begun to take their toll.

1982-2001

The first generation of Greek Anarchists were disappointed, and the great majority of them left the movement gradually, when the first Socialist Party government was elected in 1981 and in alliance with the Communist Party attempted to end "the social war" of the '70s. Isolated from everywhere, the Anarchist movement took a downturn. A new wave of young Anarchists, more aggressive and violent than the first generation, emerged in the mid-80s, influenced by the punk subculture.

Between 1985-1986,almost daily demos and clashes between Anarchists and the police took place in Athens. Α 15-year old youth, Michalis Kaltezas was shot dead by the police during this period and his killing caused huge riots in Athens and Thessaloníki.The government reaction to the occupation of the Chemistry School in Athens made the oppression against Anarchists almost unbearable, but the Anarchist movement survived, and managed to stage demonstrations with thousands of participants in Athens. The attack by an Anarchist demonstration on the hotel "Caravel" hosting a far-right conference (among the participants was Jean-Marie Le Pen

Jean-Marie Le Pen

Jean-Marie Le Pen is a French far right-wing and nationalist politician who is founder and former president of the Front National party. Le Pen has run for the French presidency five times, most notably in 2002, when in a surprise upset he came second, polling more votes in the first round than...

) was also a peak in the Anarchist movement of '80s. In 1989 the Socialist Party was again in the opposition and the Communist Party in the (right-wing) government.
The 80s generation faded slowly, and a new wave of Anarchists appeared in the wake of the 1991 high school student uprising. The 1991 high school student movement was the most massive ever in Greece, involving about 1500 school occupations and demonstrations of hundreds of thousands of people. The murder of leftist teacher Nikos Temponeras by thugs of the ruling right-wing New Democracy

New Democracy (Greece)

New Democracy is the main centre-right political party and one of the two major parties in Greece. It was founded in 1974 by Konstantinos Karamanlis and formed the first cabinet of the Third Hellenic Republic...

party caused an almost general insurgency in all main Greek towns, with a 25,000 strong demonstration in Patra where Temponeras was killed, which was followed by the burning of the police station and the Town Hall. The same day in Athens four people died in a fire which occurred during a massive demonstration. The civil unrest stopped only after the minister of Education resigned.

The Anarchist movement of the '90s faced disaster after another occupation of the Polytechnic School in 1995. In a desperate move, about 3,000 people initially occupied the Polytechnic for one night and in the end the police got in and arrested all 504 Anarchists left inside. The building was badly vandalized during the occupation. The media played a dirty role, "ordering" the police to attack, arrest, and beat up "those hooligans, those thugs". But instead of strengthening the Anarchist movement, as oppression did before, this time it tore it apart. After Michalis Prekas, Anarchist Christos Marinos also got shot and killed by police after some years.

2002-2008

In 2002, the "Anti-authoritarian Movement" ("Antiexousiastiki Kinisi") was established on the general lines of Left Anarchism and direct action. It is active mainly in Athens, Saloniki, and a few more urban centers. In 2004, Anarchists opposed the staging of the Olympic Games in Athens because of the intensification of state control and repression. Since that time, many Anarchist posters and pamphlets appear in two or more languages: Greek and Albanian (and sometimes Cyrillic, Arabic, and Georgian), showing solidarity to "foreign" workers in Greece.

December 2008

On December 6, 2008, a 15 year old youth was shot dead by a policeman after a verbal exchange in the libertarian stronghold of Exarchia, Athens. Within an hour, Anarchists, leftists, and sympathisers rioted and attacked banks, police vehicles and government offices in the area. The government's attempts for a cover-up and refusal to apologise brought thousands to the streets for daily clashes and demonstrations. The parliament building was besieged for weeks by angry crowds. Major violence erupted during one of the marches, with rioters attacking and setting fire to many public buildings, banks, and shops. Thousands of young people staged angry protests across Greece, attacking police stations in every town. In almost every neighbourhood of Athens and Pireus, police stations, banks, and big businesses were firebombed. The "December Unrest", as it became known, gave a new impetus to the Anarchists, who were at the forefront of the movement.

2010

Many anarchist groups participated in the Greek riots against the measures proposed by the government to resolve 2010 Greek economic crisis that was precipitated by the 2010 Greek sovereign debt crisis.

November the 17th

17 November is now an official school holiday in Greece, celebrating the Athens Polytechnic Uprising

Athens Polytechnic uprising

The Athens Polytechnic uprising in 1973 was a massive demonstration of popular rejection of the Greek military junta of 1967-1974. The uprising began on November 14, 1973, escalated to an open anti-junta, anti-US and anti-imperialist revolt and ended in bloodshed in the early morning of November...

of 1973 against the junta. Massive demonstrations take place in the large urban centres in memory of the dead and almost every year riots occur. Anarchists are usually blamed for inciting these riots.

1970s

The first parliamentary elections after the fall of the military junta were planned to coincide with the first anniversary of the Polytechnic Uprising, so the demonstrations were to be postponed to 24 November. Many people were opposed to that (including leftist groups and the Communist Party). In the end, two demonstrations took place: one on the 15th and the other as planned on the 24th. On the 15th, a text was distributed to the people arriving at the demonstration, which read: "Comrades, salaried slaves, one year after the November Uprising the counter-revolution is in full swing. Comrades, the November Uprising made the owners and the aspiring owners of authority shake. Comrades, all the lackeys of state and capital ask us to be productive robots, passive spectators of our lives...", and it was signed by the "Anarchist Group of Extremists". The demonstration committee declared that their position was different from the text and asked the people present to isolate the Anarchists. On May 23, 1976, a general strike turned to violent clashes between left-wing workers and students and the police. For 12 hours all of central Athens was like a battlefield. A woman was killed when a police tank ran over her. Anarchists and others fought over barricades near the Polytechnic. On 17 November 1976, the first organized Anarchist bloc took part in the demonstrations.

In November, 1978, the rally was taking place in the Polytechnic. The government had forbidden the customary march to the US embassy. The police had a very strong presence, and before the march started, minor conflicts occurred. The National Student's Union of Greece declared that the demonstration was to be canceled due to the large police force. Despite that, people went on marching and clashed with police.

1980s

In November, 1980, the atmosphere was very charged due to the killing of Assistant Commander of police's Riot Squad (MAT) by the Marxist group Revolutionary Organization 17 November

Revolutionary Organization 17 November

Revolutionary Organization 17 November , was a Marxist urban guerrilla organization formed in 1975 and believed to have been disbanded in 2002 after the arrest and trial of a...

. The march to the US embassy wasn't allowed to take place, but a demonstration took place on the 16th and Anarchists took part. When the leftist/Anarchist bloc reached Syntagma Square and attempted to march towards the US embassy, the police attacked with tear gas and smoke bombs. The demonstrators retreated, breaking windows of banks, shops and public buildings, putting up barricades and lighting fires. A small group broke into a bank and tried to break open the safe, with the intention of taking the money out and burning it in the street. The safe didn't budge. Other people were looting the jewellery and liquor stores. The police attacked back. After hours of street fighting, the result was several people injured and two dead, I. Koumis and S. Kanelopoulou. The next day another demonstration took place. In November, 1982, anarchists burned Greek flags and the wreaths laid at the memorial of the Polytechnic Uprising by politicians. Some clashes occurred.

On 16 November 1983, the office of Communist Party's mouthpiece Rizospastis

Rizospastis

Rizospastis is the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Greece. It is published daily. It was first published in 1916. Some of the more prominent editors in it are Nikos Boyiopoulos and Liana Kanelli.-Motto:...

was attacked and damaged by Anarchists, in solidarity with the Polish workers who were revolting against Stalinism. After the demonstration on the 17th, the offices of the Technical Chamber of Greece

Technical Chamber of Greece

The Technical Chamber of Greece is the Greek professional organization that serves as the official technical advisor of the Greek state and is responsible for awarding professional licences to all practicing engineers in Greece. It is a public legal entity with elected administration, supervised...

were attacked.

On 17 November 1984, a concert "against state repression" was planned but was prohibited at the last moment by the Polytechnic's rector. Massive riots started outside the Polytechnic. A text that was published after the event read: "This gave food to the rags and those who think that the university is their kingdom. It's up to us if they will taste this food for a lifetime and burp happily or if they will throw it up and then crawl in their dirty un-orgasmic Party offices."
In November, 1985, clashes with the police could be witnessed from the beginning, something which could be explained by the following events: Few anarchists took part in this year's demonstration but when it ended, they broke into the offices of South Africa Airlines, as a protest against apartheid. The clashes continued around Exarchia Square and a 15 year old, Michalis Kaltezas, was shot dead by a policeman. The Anarchists occupied the Polytechnic and the clashes continued until the police broke in. The same day the school was re-squatted and Stournari street was blocked. Demonstrations and further clashes occurred with the police but in the night everything stopped. Leftists criticized the clashes and said that if the Anarchists didn't riot more people would demonstrate for the death of M. Kaltezas.

Probably the most massive Anarchist demonstration for 17 November occurred in 1986.

In 1987, when government officials tried to place wreaths at the memorial site of the Polytechnic, clashes started which escalated into a riot that lasted three days. Clashes also occurred outside of the U.S. embassy.

The Anarchist block of 1989 was probably the smallest for a decade and after an attack by the police during the march it disbanded after some small clashes.

1990s

In November, 1990, Anarchists gathered at the rear of the customary demonstration and attacked banks and public buildings. Minor clashes with the police occurred as well.

At midday, on 16 November 1992, the Ministry of Labor was attacked with firebombs and in the evening a solidarity demonstration to the jailed Anarchists N. Maziotis, N. Skiftoulis, K. Mazokopos and B. Tsouris who were on hunger strike took place. It ended in clashes with the police around the Polytechnic. On the 17th the offices of the New Democracy Party and two bus ticket booths were burned down during clashes. 26 people were arrested.

In 1993, during 15, 16 and 17 November, Anarchists handed out leaflets, made banners for the occasion, and sprayed their slogans on the walls of the Polytechnic. On the 16th, around 30 people attacked a police bus on Kanigos Square and two luxury cars parked outside the General Accountant's Building with firebombs. On the 17th, while the officials were giving their speeches for the "holiday", a group attacked riot police stationed outside the Polytechnic with firebombs, rocks, and flares. Later that evening a van from TV station SKAI was destroyed.

Imprisoned Greek anarchists

G. Dimitrakis, arrested in Athens on 16 November 2007 for armed bank robbery. Sentenced to 35 years in prison.

Nikos Maziotis, Pola Roupa and Kwstas Gournas arrested for armed struggle.Have claimed responsibility as Members of Revolutionary Struggle
Harris Hajimixelakis, Panagiotis Argyrou and Gerasimos Tsakalos,proud members of Conspiracy of Cores of Fire
Hristos Stratigopoulos, arrested for bank robbery. Sentenced to 8,5 years.
Giannis Skouloudis, arrested and claimed responsibility for arson. Awaiting trial
Alexander Kossyvas, Mihalis Traikapis, arrested for bank robbery. Awaiting trial

Up to date Greek activist prisoner list: http://tameio.espivblogs.net/kratoumenoi-epikoinwnia/

External links

In Greek:

Anarchy Press
Rioter.info
Anarchy.gr
Athens Independent Media Center
Lelas Karagiani Squat (Archived 2009-10-25)
Anarchist Archive (Anarhiki Archeiothiki)
Anarchist Bulletin (Anarchiko Deltio) (Archived 2009-10-25)
Greek Anarchist archive page (some texts in English) (Archived 2009-10-25)
Anarchist Archive of Thessaloniki (Archived 2009-10-25)
Patision & skaramaga squat
English section of TPTG site

In English:

Insurrection v.s. Organization: Reflections from Greece on a Pointless Schism - Analysis by Peter Gelderloos
Peter Gelderloos
Peter Gelderloos is an American anarchist author known for his 2005 book, How Nonviolence Protects the State.Gelderloos was arrested in 2001 while attending a protest at the Georgia-based Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation , a controversial school that trains Central and South...
325 No State (Greek anarchist site):

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