Gentechnik-Schaugarten in Üplingen besetzt!

On the Greek Riots
Irregular updates and articles on the situation in Greece, in English
Skip to content
AboutAthens riot mapThis blog in FrenchThis blog in GermanThis blog in RussianThis blog in SpanishThis blog in Turkish
#45, 12:55: Multinational shops smashed in Kolonaki, central Athens
Friday, March 13, 2009
Reports are coming in that, approximately 20 minutes ago (12:30 GMT+2, Greek time) a group of around 50 people attacked high-stret shops in the affluent central Athens area of Kolonaki. Multinational outlets such as Benetton, Sisley, Zara and Rococo were smashed while leaflets calling for the liberation of Yorgos Voutsis-Votzatzis, an anarchist prisoner, were distributed. Kolonaki is the most central of Athens’ affluent, upper-class neighbourhoods and adjacent to Eksarcheia. Eye-witnesses report that no looting took place. Riot police and special police units are now in the area.



Filed in short report | Comments (0)
Friday 13.3: London Solidarity Event for Konstantina Kuneva
Monday, March 9, 2009
Konstantina Kuneva is a female, single mother, migrant worker and grassroots syndicalist who was attacked with sulfuric acid by employer-hired thugs in late December 2008. She has suffered major injuries and is being treated in intensive care in Athens since. The attack happened in the aftermath of the December revolt, and the solidarity response of the movement was vigorous and dynamic throughout the country. Fund raising events are still taking place in various greek cities because of the urgent need for money, that will allow Konstantina to travel to the USA for an elaborate and very expensive operation, which her only chance to have some of her basic bodily functions restored.

Benefit event for Konstantina: Screenings, discussion, food and live music on Friday March 13 from 5 to 11 at 100 Flowers squat, 2A Belgrade Road, Dalston N16 8DJ. The event is organised jointly by Greek comrades in solidarity, local Turkish/Kurdish workers organizations, and comrades from North East London squats.

For more info on Konstantina’s case, most of the greek texts that have been translated into english can be found here.



Filed in Uncategorized | Comments (2)
In the struggle against this world, Konstantina is not alone
Thursday, March 5, 2009
(second in a series of texts on Konstantina that are distributed in the streets of Athens these days - the first one is here)



When, in hearing Konstantina Kuneva’s name, we bring in mind “slave-trade” and the new work conditions’ “Middle Ages” we immediately forget that the model of subcontracting workers via agencies is not a set-back of the capitalist system to archaic models of work management that should be somehow “reviewed”. It is one of the most extreme contemporary forms of exploitation.

We forget that, from the continuous intensification and flexibility of work conditions to insurance, job lay-offs and work accidents, the attack of the bosses concerns the repressed in their entirety – and in this sense one and all can feel close to them the case of Konstantina.

So-called “employer lawlessness” does not concern individual bosses and specialised exploitation methods. The maximization-of-profit-by-all-means is the only issue that concerns each and every boss, who “risk their capital” over our own heads. The terrorism of the bosses concerns conditions of exception as much as the bullets of the cops do. Although, in the case of the attack against Konstantina what shocked was the upgraded form of violence against her, her case managed to spontaneously reveal to one and all that the bosses drink our blood by all means possible every-single-day.

Solidarity is not humanism of any sort. Solidarity means to take a stance: to connect the events with their true causes, the dismissal of life with the real face of its executioners. The increasingly conscious polarisation is the only radical and feasible answer to the war waged from the bosses and organised apathy. In the face of the coming revolt, compiling our negations is half of our common task.

In the struggle against this world Konstantina is not alone.

Filed in analysis | Comments (2)
#45 10.06 Athens Railway carriages burnt, “16 million euros” in damage reported
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
On the early hours of Tuesday, six carriages of the Athens-Piraeus Railway (ISAP) were petrol-bombed and burnt. According to eye-witnesses and the proclamation issued by the group that claimed responsibility for the attack, no passengers or staff were put at risk during the attack as they were asked to vacate the carriages before hand.

According to Railway officials and mainstream media reports, the total damage by the attack is in the region of 16 million euros.

In a communiqué released on Athens IMC, a group calling itself “Gangs of Consciousness Extremists of Perama” (a working class neighbourhood close to Piraeus - trans) state, among many others:

(…) So we wiped out two trains of ISAP, causing disturbance. We had no hesitation to sabotage the commuting route of all who are in peace with the sterilised transportation from and to their workplace, from and to their homes, from and to their leisure destinations. Maybe this will replace their fish-like gaze of apathy and indifference from their faces with some more energetic and tense gazes.

No matter how many working sites they set up, security in transport will be in question from now on. The free transportation of people like products will turn into a free transportation of insecurity within the centres of command in the metropolis.

To Konstantina Kuneva we send our warmest wishes and our respect for her dignified stance against the body-snatchers of politics who wanted to cash her out with a slot in their voting lists. Contrary to the slave-like misery of the majority of her workmates, she stood up, even within the framework of reformist syndicalism. Let the attack against her, by the paid bastards of ΟΙΚΟΜΕΤ with the shared guilt of the administration of ISAP, let this become an example of how syndicalist demands, to the small extent that they might become dangerous, are paid back tenfold by each employer’s thugs. The legal demands of employees to each employer are not always dealt with equally legally.

(see comments for a small disclaimer)

Filed in short report | Comments (1)
#44, 08.28 Afghani migrant still in critical condition; demonstration called for 6pm today in Patras
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
The Afghani migrant injured yesterday is still in a critical condition, yet various mainstream media reports and posts on Athens and Patras IMCs claiming he has died are not true.

There is a demonstration called for 6pm today in the city of Patras - a short report will be posted here.

Filed in short report | Comments (1)
#43 23:29 Afghani migrant critically injured in Patras; clashes with riot police erupt
Monday, March 2, 2009
On the afternoon of March 2 an Afghani migrant was critically injured when hit by a truck in the port city of Patras. According to eyewitnesses the migrant was deliberately run over by the truck driver, having just fell off from another truck he was trying to hide into in order to get on board a ferry to Italy.
Infuriated migrants and others in solidarity clashed with the riot police who were quickly reinforced with the only too well known “concerned citizens”, ie local fascists. Barricades were set up and the riot police responded with tear gas and few consecutive charges that pushed the gathered crowd into the main migrant camp, approx two kilometres from the city’s port.

The situation seems to have de-escalated at the moment. More tomorrow.

On a different note, to those who have been asking what happened to the to Greek IMC’s (Athens and Patras) - they are both facing technical problems - this isn’t a state attack, only technical difficulties that people are working round the clock to resolve…

Filed in short report | Comments (2)
My Kuneva
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Text translated from the blog of the Anarchist Incentive of Aigaleo (Aigaleo is a working class neighbourhood in Western Athens). Illustration by Max Andersson also in Occupied London #4.



I was born and raised in a working class neighbourhood somewhere in Western Athens.
My parents were your typical villagers who arrived in the city to fulfil the petite bourgeois dream that it promised. When I started going to school my mother spoke to me about her occupation. She told me that whenever someone asked what her job was I should say that she worked at a shirt factory. Indeed, I recycled those words of hers for many years.

My mother’s true occupation was a cleaner. In houses, in shops, uninsured, with bosses who had an increased demand for slaves. With constant negotiations over whatever little money they would pay her, with constant pleadings for them to give holiday pays she would rarely receive. All of this filled her with silence, not with a voice. Her mouth was shut to such a degree that I never remember her complaining, not even to us. Her own people. Even before growing up I decided that it would be me breaking this silence on behalf of us all. I was not ashamed. I was not ashamed to say that my mother was a cleaner. Even before growing up I spoke to her. And even before growing up she spoke to me too: she told me about her shame, her fear, for the behaviour of the “good society” to its staff, which it needs primarily for visual, aesthetic purposes.

The silence gradually broke across the entire family.

Mother’s true occupation: cleaner.
Mother’s true occupation: cleaner who will never receive a pension.
Mothers’ true occupation: cleaner with no insurance who was fired every single time she demanded what was hers.
Mother’s true occupation: cleaner with no insurance who got sworn at every single time she raised a word about her working rights.
Mother’s true occupation: “Konstantina Kuneva”.

“The sulphuric acid fell on my mother’s eyes. Her gaze is now brighter. The sulphuric acid fell on my mother’s vocal chords. Her speech is now bolder. The acid fell on my mother’s soul, too. And her shame disappeared.”

She gave money for Konstantina’s medical treatment, she wanted to take to the streets for her (even if she didn’t manage to do so) and she came out to my father’s bourgeois family about her occupation.

She told me: “I feel sad about Konstantina. Every night I think of her”.
I told her: “Today, I love you more than ever”.

X.

Filed in Uncategorized | Comments (2)
Faceless:
Thursday, February 26, 2009
(A text distributed on the streets of Athens these days. See this post for some background information on Konstantina’s case)


The attack against Konstantina Kuneva wasn’t a murderous one. Her likely death as a result of this attack was a secondary issue for the pigs who conducted it. The sulfuric acid was used for her stigmatisation, her degradation, her disgrace. For her return to order, to the domestic and private, to the role of woman.

Sulfuric acid attacks aim for the face and this is anything but a coincidence. The face of the woman in patriarchy is laid through the antagonism around stereotypes of beauty. A woman has a public face to the extent that she is beautiful. When a woman tries to gain a face not for what she “is” but for what she does, she has to be put back in her place - the place of the private, the place of gender normality as defined by male sovereignty. Especially when her position as a cleaner incorporates, more than any, the “meaning” of her social gender as the non-productive, the family-gender, the passive, the reproductive. As the servant staff of those who “really work”.

In the face of Kuneva the symbolisms of the woman, the migrant, the cleaner sprang up a movement opposite to their mirroring. The face attacked by the acid was one that attempted to gain materiality and meaning that went beyond accepted boundaries.

Kuneva perceived herself as a worker and such she stormed in the male castle of syndicalism. She therefore attacked subservience, the borders of her gender, of the domestic – challenging some of the roles upon which lays the contemporary barbarism. She turned herself into an enemy that must be eliminated, not as a physical presence but as a personality.

If the bosses wanted to kill her they would shoot her. If they wanted to terrorise her they would beat her up. They would treat her as an enemy that deserves to be punished equally – that is, as a man. Yet her burnt face is a symbol of things as they should be: the symbol of male order. The sulfuric acid will either lock her home or will turn her into a reminder of the consequences faced by any woman who questions this very order. This is the logic of the swines. And their hand was armed by the male view on things and the world. The world, that is, as it is now and as it should continue to be.

In the struggle against this world Konstantina is not alone.

Filed in Uncategorized | Comments (5)
24.2: Haunt of Migrants in Exarcheia attacked with hand-grenade
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
On the night of February 24 the Haunt of Migrants on Tsamadou Street in Exarcheia was attacked while an assembly of the Association of Conscientious Objectors was taking place inside: A hand-grenade was thrown from outside. Luckily the building’s window was shut and double-glazed - the first layer of the window broke but the hand-grenade bounced off and exploded outside.

What follows is a statement issued by the Network for Social and Political Rights, also housed in the same building.




Murderous attack with hand-grenade at the Migrants’ Haunt


Last night, February 24, at around 10.05 pm “persons unknown” threw a hand grenade at the Migrants’ Haunt at Tsamadou Street in Exarcheia, the same building hosting the offices of the Network for Social and Political Rights). At that time the Haunt was full of people as there was an open meeting of the Association of Conscientious Objectors and the co-ordinating body of our group was also having a meeting. The attack had no victims only due to sheer luck as the hand grenade did not manage to get through the double glazed window, bounced back and exploded just outside the building.

Last night’s fascist, para-statal attack is part of the wider attempt of sovereignty to strike back after December’s revolt. During all this time we have been watching the intensification of statist and para-statist (meaning, undercovers and fascists, often the same people — trans) violence as well as a dirty propaganda campaign against spaces of resistance (”the far Left is to blame for the violence”). The “persons unknown” who threw the hand grenade do not only turn against us but against the social antagonist movement as a whole, against all who revolted in December, against all who actively refuse the dictatorship of the market and the “democracy” of the batton.

It is probably unnecessary for us to say that we shall not make a single step back, it is unnecessary to say that the parastatals will receive the response they deserve.

Athens, February 25 2009

Network for Social and Political Rights

www.diktio.org


Filed in Uncategorized | Comments (2)
#41, 16:02. One hand-grenade and 41 days later: this blog is active again.
Wednesday, February 25, 2009
So, where were we?

This blog stopped being updated in late January as the main contributors left Greece and things there seemed to be getting quiter. With so many developments in the country not covered in the least by national or international media, the need was felt for this blog to be reactivated… So here it is. Same “rules” as before apply: updates will be irregular; comments will be disabled in most posts due to excessive spamming (if any of you are familiar with the wordpress platform and think you can help out on this one, get in touch!)

Posts for the next few weeks will include a mix of translations of communiques, statements etc. released from Greece, updates on the prisoners of the revolt and news updates from the ground, by the new people that are reporting from Athens and Thessaloniki.

Filed in Uncategorized, short report | Comments (4)
‹ Older postsSearch

Pages
About
Athens riot map
This blog in French
This blog in German
This blog in Russian
This blog in Spanish
This blog in Turkish
Links
O.R.A.

Occupied London
More coverage
Center For Strategic Anarchy
Crimethink
IMC Athens
Libcom
Social war in Greece
Recent Posts
#45, 12:55: Multinational shops smashed in Kolonaki, central Athens
Friday 13.3: London Solidarity Event for Konstantina Kuneva
In the struggle against this world, Konstantina is not alone
#45 10.06 Athens Railway carriages burnt, “16 million euros” in damage reported
#44, 08.28 Afghani migrant still in critical condition; demonstration called for 6pm today in Patras
Cloud
about alexandros Athens ballistic examination civil war comic cop on fire deutsch dictatorship disabled gender general strike GSEE international day Komotini kuneva migrants murderer Patras police shots polytechnic popular assemblies prisoners radio occupations school kids solidarity student shot theatre occupation Thessaloniki TV occupations

March 2009 M T W T F S S
« Feb
1
2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22
23 24 25 26 27 28 29
30 31
© 2009 ¶ Thanks, WordPress. ¶ veryplaintxt theme by Scott Allan Wallick. ¶ It's nice XHTML & CSS.

Die Zeit drängt: Im April soll die Aussaat des Gen-Mais MON810 in Deutschland beginnen. Landwirtschaftsministerin Ilse Aigner kann dies mit einem Verbot noch verhindern. Die Ministerin muss ihren Worten nun sofort Taten folgen lassen! Unterzeichnen Sie unseren Appell an Ministerin Aigner!

UNTERZEICHNEN

 http://www.campact.de/gentec/sn3/signer

Gendreck Weg!
 http://antifasozialbetrug.siteboard.de/antifasozialbetrug-post-6718.html#6718