PANHELLENIC DAY OF ACTION AGAINST THE MURDER OF MIGRANTS AT PYLOS THURSDAY 13 JULY 19:00 ATHENS GATHERING OMONOIA
DEMO TOWARDS SYNTAGMA AND EU OFFICES
On Wednesday 14/6/2023, off the coast of Pylos, a fishing boat capsized, resulting in the death of more than 600 people. Testimonies of surviving migrants speak of hundreds of women and children trapped in the holds of the fishing boat. The involvement of the Greek Coast Guard in the sinking of the vessel was immediate: not only they did not rescue the passengers when the vessel was already in danger, but according to the compelling testimonies of the survivors, the sinking occurred when the coastguards towed the vessel at high speed using a rope. With complete ignorance of the human lives, the coastguard was a spectator from a distance to the drowning of hundreds of people, launching the rescue operation after 2 full hours.
After the 104 survivors were brought to the shore, the police confiscated 40 survivors’ mobile phones that were in the Kalamata hospital and replaced them, so that the evidence of the Greek coastguard’s responsibility for the sinking of the ship would disappear. According to the survivors, the phones were working and several of them have a recording of the entire trip, including the murderous intervention of the coast guard. Of the 104 survivors of the deadly shipwreck, 9 Egyptians are accused of being traffickers and were taken in an emergency and undercover situation to Nafplion prison It is common practice after the arrival of each ship to select people randomly, and charge them with the above-mentioned charges, in order to criminalize the immigration itself. The remaining migrants, scarred by the traumatic experience, were transferred to the closed camp-prison Malakasa 2. They have no access to decent medical care, legal representation, interpretation and psychological support. They, also, cannot be informed about the situation of their relatives and friends who are missing or are in hospital after the shipwreck, which exacerbates their psychological situation. Pylos was not an accident but a mass murder by the Greek state and the EU!
On the Evros fence, at the bottom of the Aegean Sea, the security of every European is being built! The mass murder in Pylos is one of hundreds of similar crimes along the EU border in recent years, in which hundreds of people have died. While Pylos made it to the mainstream media, because of the large number of dead people, the refusal to rescue boats in distress and the murderous pushbacks at the land and sea borders of Greece/EU, are a systemic strategy by the Greek authorities and Frontex (European Border and Coast Guard Agency). Europe has turned its borders into militarized zones of state and parastatal violence against people seeking better living conditions. Greece has become the “shield of Europe” according to the President of the European Commission, by violently deterring the migrants. Thousands have been shot, beaten, sexually assaulted and abandoned at sea and in the Evros region by Greek repression forces, in cooperation with Frontex. The policies of torture, disappearance and pushbacks in Greece have forced migrants to follow even more dangerous routes to reach Europe. In 2022, at least 3,800 people were killed on migratory routes in and from the Central Eastern and North African regions, at least 326, only, on the border between Greece and Turkey. The border killings must stop!
Many people are leaving from war, persecution, economic violence and climate disasters caused by states, the EU, the capital, NATO and other imperialist powers. An illustrative example of the ‘civilised’ west is the EU’s cooperation with authoritarian regimes such as the Turkish and Libyan states, reinforcing racist/taxis warfare, externalising control of European borders and causing more refugee/migration, death and suffering.
The Greek state as part of these policies is leading the border killings, constructing a fake national unity, producing racism within Greek society and paving the way for the resurgent nationalism (pogroms, beatings, etc.). At the same time, it exploits economically those who manage to survive at the borders in labour sweatshops, imprisons in modern concentration camps those who are surplus to its needs and rewards with more jobs and bonuses the border guards who have been doing golden jobs for years alongside Frontex and the paramilitary mafias.
From our own position, we must resist to racism, to the militarization of borders and the criminalization of immigration. We build common struggles of local and migrant women, demand access to papers, healthcare and education for all and resist at all policies that cause death, migration, exploitation and all kinds of oppression.
•The murder in Pylos will not be forgotten •Solidarity to the survivors!
•Immediate release of the 9 imprisoned migrants!
Stop the crimes of the Coast Guard and the war against migrants! Abolish Frontex! •Immediate access to papers, decent housing-care-education for all!
•Freedom of movement for all!
We are calling: Thursday 13/07 Athens gathering at 19:00 at Omonoia and demo towards Syntagma and EU offices
Be there!
Immigrants are class brothers and sisters. Concentration camps never and nowhere! We live together, we work together, locals and migrants smash Nazis!