In Greece the cops are torturing anti-fascist protesters, apparently; at least that’s what the protesters claim.
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.
One wonders if the cops are Golden Dawn.
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.
That is disgusting.
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.
Quick, somebody call for a chat over a beer. Surely they can just work it out.
Yes, they most likely are:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/oct/26/golden-dawn-infiltrated-greek-police-claims
More telling, in the last elections, polling stations where the majority of voters were police officers, GD’s numbers were triple to quadruple the national average.
Link is here, but it’s in Greek.
http://www.tovima.gr/society/article/?aid=463063
Let’s make sure we know how ‘offended’ they were.
I think a link to ‘Don’t let’s be beastly to the Germans.’ would fit nicely here.
Austerity is the only way to prove a nation is responsible for its debts ‘n’ shit. Austerity, because it was social programs that caused the economic crisis. Yeah. No one is gonna get tweaked about that and turn into a NAZI. That totally had nothing to do with the actual rise of the original NAZI party. Where does the [/sarcasm] go? I broke my brain writing this.
The response from the minister? To throw a hissy fit in parliament and proclaim he would sue The Guardian. This was back in October. Last month when I asked Maria Margaronis on twitter if she’d gotten anything she said nothing had arrived quite yet.
Of course, this administration has plenty of guys who like to talk a big game and threaten legal action, including against yours truly.
Oh, forgot. Here’s a link to the story about Dendias threatening the Guardian: http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite1_1_19/10/2012_466603
If they want to meet for a beer, I hear there is a good selection in Munich. Golden Dawn can offer “peace in our time”. Or has that been done already?
Seriously, what does it mean to be in the Euro zone, if a country is run like this? That’s what Angela Merkel needs to be explaining. Her government has decided to overrule textbook economics, just because, and refuse enough aid, just because, but when it comes to human rights abuse, I don’t really think that this position represents the will of the modern German people. When letter-writers in Germany start making this point in their press, perhaps some words from the continent’s dominatrix will bring some relief to the strangulation going on in the cradle of democracy.
just to be clear, this guardian piece is from october 2012. not that things are any better — they’re worse.
and yes, there’s a high percentage of GD members among the police.