Monday, January 31, 2011

All of the Thessaloniki 4 are free*

Monday, January 31, 2011The four* comrades, including UK anarchist Simon Chapman, have been found not guilty for all (except one minor charge) in Greek court of the charges going back to the EU Summit protests and riots in Thessaloniki in 2003.
All four of the defendants are free. All the initial charges were dropped apart from “distinguished defiance of authority” which was then reduced to “minor defiance of authority”. This is a misdemeanour, carrying a 6-month suspended sentence, but none of them will be imprisoned unless of course someone is charged again during these six months. This was the best the juries could ever do, since they had to be charged of something, in order to “justify” the six months they had spent in prison back in 2003.
*Three are officially free while one of the four, comrade Michalis Traikapis, although aquitted for this charge is imprisoned accused of bank robbery.

At 11:20 a.m. on September 17, 2010, four people in ski masks robbed a bank at gunpoint in the small town of Psachna on the island of Evia north of Athens. A half-hour later, on a motorway road near the island’s capital Chalcis, a 27-year-old man, a 28-year-old man, and a 35-year-old woman were arrested. They were brought to the Chalcida police station, where the men—Alexandros Kossivas and Michalis Traikapis—were charged with the armed bank robbery and the Maria Ekonomou was charged with “aiding and abetting fugitives.” The charges were based largely on the comrades’ connection to the anarchist milieu (Traikapis was one of the Thessaloniki 7, along with two Spanish comrades and others, arrested during the riots surrounding the 2003 EU summit in that city and finally released thanks to a lengthy hunger strike) and http://saloniki2003.blogspot.com/2010/05/call-for-solidarity-with-prisoners-of.htmldubious witness testimony (one of the witnesses, a kiosk attendant, supposedly remembered one of the comrades—just prior to the robbery—asking: “Excuse me, but where is the bank?”). The comrades didn’t have any weapons or “loot” on them at the time of the arrests, while searches of their Athens homes revealed nothing more than “ski masks, four 9 mm bullets, and other objects that are being investigated.” Nevertheless, Kossivas and Traikapis are currently in prison, while the Maria was released on probation. It’s expected that they will soon write something that states their position regarding the charges, their political identity, etc.

Letter from the three accused of the robbery in Evia, central Greece
19/10/10
clik on to read the letter....
actforfreedomnow.blogspot.com/search/label/Letter from the three accused of the robbery in Evia

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Solidarity Poster for Polykarpos Georgiadis and Vaggelis Chrisohoidis (greece)



POSTER SAYS:
did anyone speak of a
KIDNAPPING?
“…A handful of capitalists
have organized a criminal gang
and have kidnapped the proletarians,
demanding for ransom
their labor force,
merchandising their human activity,
their time (which is turned into money),
their own being itself…”
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
to vaggelis Chrisohoidis and Polykarpos Georgiadis
who the persecuting authorities, exactly because they denied to betray values and people,
accuse them as participators in the kidnapping of industrialist Milonas
anarchists from Serres from north-greece


Anarchists solidarity protest outside Korydallos prison, the main prison in Athens, at the time of the change of the year. This protest happens every New Year's Eve for the past six years. This year more than 400 people took part in the protest that interacted with the prisoners inside through shouting mutual slogans and fireworks. The main slogan was "The passion for freedom is stronger that your prisons".
NEW YEAR OUTSIDE IN KORRIDALOS PRISON 2011
Watch live streaming video from agitprop at livestream.com
FIRE TO ALL PRISONS

A society that punishes/the condition of incarceration/the prison of the mind/the prison as punishment/the rage of the damned will sound on the ruins of prisons/those denying obedience and misery of our era even within its hellholes/will dance together on the ruins of every last prison/with the flame of rebellion avenging whatever creates prisons.

To the prisoners struggle already counting one dead and thousands in hunger strike across greece, we stand in solidarity and anger until the destruction of every last prison.


ARSON AND WILDFIRE FOR EVERY PRISON

SOLIDARITY TO ALL PRISONERS IN GREECE


Keny Arkana - La Rage English Subtitles

1976 - 2000 Greek Anarchists Fight for Freedom

(December Riots in Greece)