Greek people defy state repression to honour murdered student

 Written by: Communist Party of Greece (Marxist-Leninist) on 9 December 2020

Crackdown and state terrorism all over Greece, on the pretext of demonstrations in memory of the murdered student, Alexis Grigoropoulos.

Today, on December 6th 2020, 12 years have passed since the murder of the 15 year-old student Alexis Grigoropoulos, who was shot dead by the police officer Korkoneas, under the state's responsibility. This murder didn't only shake Greece, but peoples all around the globe.

This murder was the straw that broke the camel's back and brought about a youth uprising, since they saw their own reflection in the face of Grigoropoulos, given the fundamental crisis of the capitalist-imperialist crisis, with a future that is both uncertain and without any prospect. School and university students as well as broader parts of the Greek youth were daily protesting and organising demonstrations, take-overs and assemblies in schools and universities. In front of the beating, the tear-gas and the arrests, they were more and more infuriated, because they understood more and more that Alexis Grigoropoulos' death was not an accident, but the real face of this rotting system.

Ever since on December the 6th demonstrations take place, organised by left-wing and other progressive forces of the movement, around the country. So, even this year, despite the difficulties posed by the coronavirus pandemic, demonstrations were organised all along Greece, by the CPG (m-l) and other organisations of the extra-parliamentary Left, respecting all the sanitary, self-protection measures and the distance between persons as they have been doing up to now. The CPG (m-l) wanted to highlight through these demonstrations some other political aspects as well; those of answering the government's policy and struggling for those measures, none of which was taken for the sake of the people's health. The only measures taken have to do with repression, such as fines, more policing and dropping democratic rights, such as assembling above a certain number of persons which was processed through an unofficial coup-like decree. Therefore it is obvious that Alexis' murder was in harmony with the policy of the system and the capital that care about no human lives, only about profit and exploitation.

So this year the system and the New Democracy government, on the pretext of the pandemic threat, prohibited demonstrations and assemblies on December 6th, stating that they will make no step back against «violators» of this ban. Exactly the same as they did with the antiimperialist demonstration in memory of the Polytechnic Uprising on November 17th and those of the strike on November 26th.

However their announcements didn't instill terror on the organised Left. Particularly the CPG (m-l) attempted to walk the road and defy the terrorising, despite the thousands of policemen in the centre of Athens, despite the surrounding of the organisation's political bookshop «Out of the walls». The organisation's members and the General Secretary of the party faced arrests and crackdown by the riot police forces, who took 12 of them to the General Police Headquarters of Attica, alongside tens of other militants of the Left.

In Thessaloniki at least 4 demonstrations took place, organised by forces of the left and anarchist collectives, and police hunted down and apprehended demonstrators just after the protests. One of these demonstrations took place in front of the French Consulate, showing international solidarity to the struggling French people and the French youth.

The crackdown in Crete was equivalent, with intense police presence in both its major cities, Herakleion and Chania, with arrests and apprehensions; among them members of the CPG (m-l) too.

Therefore it is hypocrisy at least that the government which uses its cronies to gather tens or hundreds of people inside the police departments, the government which has criminally degraded the healthcare system, the government and the system that work to maximize poverty and misery, to talk of a supposed sanitary danger of the demonstrations. These demonstrations take place so we can defend our lives and this is a problem for them, this is why all the mainstream Media slander them madly.

We call upon all of the people to fight and denounce this outbreak of state terror whose only goal is to frighten the employed, the youth and the people, in order to be able to promote further its wild class offensive against their interests. Because they know that the people's rage is getting larger by the day, especially while the victims of the system's criminal handling of the pandemic grow daily.

Organising, resisting and struggling are the weapons and the answers which can give rise to better days for the people. Against all their efforts to strike fear, until victory and their overthrow.

We demand that all apprehended, are freed immediately!

We demand the immediate repeal of the junta-inspired prohibition of demonstrations!

CPG (m-l)
International Bureau
Athens - December 2020

Greek fascist party convicted of criminality

 Written by: Communist Party of Greece (Marxist-Leninist) on 9 October 2020

Golden Dawn, the neo-Nazi organisation that was the third-largest party in the Greek parliament in the 2012 elections, has been convicted by the Athens Appeals Court of being a criminal organisation.

In 2012, the party won 18 seats on an anti-immigrant, racist ant-worker platform.  There are no seats held by the party in the current parliament.

In court were 68 member defendants jointly accused of running a criminal organisation.  Their crimes included the murder of an anti-fascist rapper musician, and violent attacks on migrants and left-wing political opponents. Five Golden Dawn members were convicted of the attempted murders of Egyptian fishermen and four of the attempted murder of communist activists in the PAME union

Excerpts from a statement released two days ago by the Communist Party of Greece (Marxist-Leninist) follow:
………………..

More than 25,000 people gathered on Alexandras Avenue and surrounding streets erupted in applause with the announcement of the decision of the Criminal Court of Appeals at the Golden Dawn trial. Only minutes later, riot police attacked with an obvious predetermined government plan to dismantle the rally with chemicals, flash grenades and water spraying from their modern new armored vehicles…

CPG (m-l), formed a militant block from 9.30 in the morning, with the goal of expressing with its banner, slogans and announcements its perception and political position both for the specific fascist-Nazi organization and its trial, as well as for the system that nurtured it and today "replaces" and "withdraws" it, because of its own contradictions, but of course also as a result of the pressure of the people. All left forces and the anarchists were present. People responded to the general call, despite the overall right-wing shift of the political scene and the anti-popular policies they have to endure, because they felt that this day "belonged" to them. All those tens of thousands of protesters in many cities of the country prove that reflexes still exist in the masses…

For years the imperialists, the bourgeoisie, the state and their system "invested" in Golden Dawn. They nurtured it, supported it, made it gigantic, they made the fascist "agenda" the basic political direction and implemented policy of all bourgeois governments. It was flesh from the flesh of the system, a helper to the repression mechanisms, an acceptable interlocutor for the bourgeoisie, a figure next to high-ranking government officials and not just system executives, with open multifaceted channels of communication between them. 

Today, they all lie and pretend they had nothing to do with it. However, the race for political exploitation of Golden Dawn’s "pool of votes", reveals otherwise. At a time of great pressure for the system on both the economy and the so-called national issues (economic and geostrategic memoranda, as we have called them), at a time when capitalist-imperialist aggression intensifies, an openly fascist version with an "anti-systemic" profile was useful, to channel the anger of the people in paths painless for the system. Always against the workers, the refugees-immigrants, the toilers, the youth. That is how the fascist formation was laundered…

All those who even had open political dealings with it, who tolerated its actions, who grafted their programs with extreme right-wing, chauvinist and racist positions, who knew of its high percentages in the police force, in the highest ranks of military and judicial level, pretend today that they were the ignorant and condemn this "exception" of their political system...

We are of the opinion that fascism -as the offspring of the system- will continue to exist and operate to its advantage. Its uprooting requires the strengthening of the workers and the revolutionary communist movement. As much as we rejoiced together with all the truly democratic and anti-fascist people, we also know that the womb that gives birth to it will continue to reproduce and transform it in various forms, more or less obvious, covered or uncovered. And if today the regime made the choice to "end" with the specific model of the criminal-knife-thrower who reveals and exposes it, the official political system will continue to promote fascist practices in public and political life. In this sense, fascism will disappear only when the working class and the people take over political power and the administration of society, when they overthrow the system of dependence and exploitation.

Until then, we have many more episodes of "resorting" to fascism to see, in its most official governmental, state versions. We are not done with fascism. The struggle continues!
 
October 7, 2020
The Press Office of CPG (m-l)

 

Joint statement of the Greek and Turkish Marxist-Leninist parties

{The CPA (M-L) reprints below a joint statement of the Greek and Turkish Marxist-Leninist parties. The parties set a fine example – against a background of ruling class nationalist rivalry - of proletarian internationalism: seeling to find unity on the basis of their shared interests as working classes.   Australians of Greek and Turkish origin have a vested interest in seeking a peaceful outcome of disputes in the Aegean Sea, the Balkans and the Middle East.  All Australian workers have a vested interest in maintaining global peace in the face of imperialist willingness to risk regional and global war - ed.}

The crisis of the global capitalist-imperialist system fuels and is fueled by the contradictions of the imperialist powers at all levels. All around the world workers and peoples are facing the most ferocious attack of the system's forces which seek a solution in an ever greater and more profound barbarism. In our countries the working class and the peoples live in the conditions of fierce exploitation, unemployment, and impoverishment. The working force is getting discredited, the social and democratic rights of the masses are being trampled upon. In the meantime, the imperialist grip is tightening in a region which constitutes an ardent and crucial arena of the global imperialist competition. A region in which American, Russian, Chinese, and European imperialists come across and clash according to the ambitions and magnitudes of each, in a tangle of contradictions, that daily magnifies the dangers for the peoples.

In this context the peril of war that threatens the peoples on the both sides of the Aegean Sea grows ever larger. A peril that is rooted in the particular and specific features, and in the history of the two countries' reactionary confrontation, but at the same time constitutes an integral part of the turmoil and of the developments that are occurring across the region.

The first most, main, and determinative factor of these developments is the politics and ambitions of the USA. Trump's administration, which navigates with the goal of restricting the reinforcement of Russian imperialism's presence and of repelling it from the Balkans, the Middle East, and the Eastern Mediterranean, is undertaking a series of aggressive and extortionist steps. Steps that aim at the declared USA's strategic goal of world dominance, which calls for the enfeeblement and neutralization of the only power that can prove competitive at a strategic (nuclear) level: Russia. Steps which target to extort/drag their European allies/competitors in favor of the American ambitions. Steps which intend to block the endeavors of Chinese imperialism in the region and in Europe. Steps that kindle tensions and contradictions between regional and local powers in the greater region, the wounds of which are open and the bloody confrontations of the past and the present imperialist interventions are ongoing.

It is in this context that the reactionary rivalry of the Greek and Turkish bourgeois classes is being rekindled and aggravated. The two bourgeois classes are dependent upon American imperialism, which for decades now uses both countries as a geostrategic bulwark against the former Soviet Union and Russia, as a platform for its campaigns to the Balkans, the Black Sea, Caucasus, Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean, or even as an extortion instrument against the EU imperialists. Two bourgeois classes which haven't ceased to manifest their competition and to claim favorable roles from their transatlantic patron. A competition that has to do not only with the fact of which one will be favored over the other regarding roles and missions in the region. It also concerns matters of sovereignty for each of them from Thrace and the Aegean Sea to Cyprus, where both parties have contributed to its division. Neither of the competitors has ever aimed at a peaceful settlement of the existing matters, but at the "prevalence" of one over the other, with ceaseless nationalist sermons from both sides. In such a competition, which constantly reproduced and intensified the imperialist dominance and fueled the arms race, the two bourgeois classes have attempted to drag both our peoples behind their reactionary ambitions. Whether brandishing actual facts of this competition (such as the political-military defeat of the Greek side in 1974), or highlighting the new objectives, new "capabilities" of their reactionary ambitions.

Under the current conditions each bourgeois class has accumulated a heavy burden of cul-de-sac and opportunistic ambitions.

The Turkish side has perceived the bloodshed in the M. East, the vacillations of USA regarding the relations they will have with and the roles they will assign to the new powers (Iran, Israel, Saudi Arabia...), as an "opportunity" to promote Turkey as a dominant peripheral power, as a solution to its great socio-economic problems and its "on-paper" development, until the "decisive moment" when it will crush the just struggle of the Kurdish people. Therefore, on the one hand, the Turkish fascist regime, enshrouded in a parliamentary cloak, heightens its reactionary assault against the peoples and the masses of Turkey and campaigns in Afrin, while at the same time it intensifies its confrontation with the Greek side and openly manifests -by the means of FYROM matter (ie Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia – ed)- its aspirations for its presence and role in the Balkans. However, the Turkish regime certainly cannot be considered all-mighty. The contradiction of the popular-working masses is extremely acute, as it became clear the previous years (Taksim), and today, with the thousands of imprisoned and persecuted. And as the coup of June 2016 has demonstrated, the balances of the regime are unsteady, while the American extortions are fueling the instability and contradictions in its interior. Besides, the "European solution", that Erdogan sought, has been blocked by the American and European imperialists, while steps towards Russia merely demonstrate the regime's efforts to negotiate the terms of its dependency from the USA. Also, now with the conquest of Afrin, the Turkish regime is burdened with a success not easily manageable military and politically in anticipation of the developments that will follow in the region. A success that might generate new pressures and produce new opportunism.

Accordingly, the Greek bourgeoisie attempts to find a way out of the compression of its credit margins and ambitions, that it has suffered during the last years in the clamping jaws of the USA-EU contradictions, undertaking "geostrategical" roles of servitude of its US/NATO bosses. It also believes that it has an opportunity to transform the balance of powers with its main competitor: Turkey, which at the moment is intertwined in a tangle of contradictions and problems, and having the advantage, as the Greek bourgeoisie believes, of upgrading its use by the USA as opposed to Russia. This is why it rushes in the Balkans to serve the multi-level US interference-intervention aimed at the geopolitical, energy, and military exclusion of Russia from the peninsula. That is why, on the pretext of the refugee problem, and with the real objective of controlling the Russian descent in the Mediterranean, it was decided “overnight” to install NATO in the Aegean. That is why the alliance "axes" have been established for years with Israel and Egypt, and recently also with Saudi Arabia. Axes that the US promoted to extort Turkey's compliance with their demands and have been recently upgraded, with the Greek government looking forward to ensuring the support of these forces against Turkey, even in the event of a violent episode. Overall, the SYRIZA-ANEL government, with the upgrading of the US military and political dominance over the country and with all its political and diplomatic moves in the region, has turned Greece hostile to the peoples of the region, in servitude of the US/NATO military plans. A special role in its anti-historical and dangerous for its peoples’ aspirations, is reserved for the EEZ (Exclusive Economic Zones), through the proclamation of which the Greek side aims to "exclude" Turkey, and even to extend its own dominance over the Ionian (in confrontation with Albania) and of course over the Aegean Sea up to the South Mediterranean. However, the EEZs constitute in instrument in the hands of the imperialists so that their multinational companies can pillage energy resources of the region. But, above all, in order to form alliances with the local forces to support their own ambitions (such as the US with the so-called axes of Greece) as well as to acquire decisive capacities in matters of sovereignty of the countries of the region.

Cyprus is also being pulled into the swirl of these developments, whose people, Greek and Turkish Cypriots, lives under the conditions of occupation and partitioning, under the imposition and involvement of British, American, European, and Russian imperialism, and under the ever-intensifying intent of Western imperialists for it to become a protectorate/unsinkable aircraft carrier of their war plans. A goal that on the one hand employs the Turkish occupation and on the other uses Greek ambitions to accept leading roles in the region, in order to impose new “Annan plans” (a UN-sponsored plan for the reunification of Cyprus as two federal states with a single federal government -ed) on the much-suffered island and to construct the southern energy pipelines that will complement the blockage of Russian energy to Europe.

This is the reactionary context in which all the tension episodes of the recent period have taken place in the Aegean Sea, in the Cyprus area, and on the borders of the Evros river. It is in this context, which is constantly fueled by the aggressive moves of American imperialism throughout the region, but also heated by the subjugated and unraveled bourgeois classes of the two countries and their nationalistic exclamations, that the peril of an unjust war intensifies. A peril which is already being used to the detriment of the rights and the struggle of the workers and the popular masses of the two countries. A war that in the given circumstances can cause a wider outbreak throughout the region from the Mediterranean to the Balkans!

Our peoples have nothing to divide! The path of following the bourgeois class of each country will lead to an obvious deadend and a danger to their interests. Whether it is in this or another conjuncture that the US/NATO projects and interests favor the pursuits of one or another ruling class does not concern the interests of the masses. In any development, when our peoples are followers of the bourgeoisie and submissive to imperialism, it is they who will pay even with their own blood the imperialist and reactionary war plans.

Our peoples must join their struggle for their common future! Because there are no nationalist ideas of "lost empires" and "historical territories” in the hearts of our peoples. In the hearts of our peoples dwells the desire for bread - work - peace - independence! The vision of our peoples may be the revolutionary socialist prospect and their pursuit of peace, friendship, and solidarity with all peoples of the region. That is why today it is necessary and imperative to struggle for a broad and massive anti-war movement on both sides of the Aegean Sea. It is the only thing that can block the imperialist plans and open the way for the confrontation with the real enemies of our peoples.

No to war - Our peoples are not cannon fodder

Friendship – solidarity – common struggle of all peoples and nations of the region

No to nationalism and fascism!

The imperialists are the arsonists of wars! Out with the Americans, European and Russian imperialists from the region

Out with the US-NATO bases in Greece, Turkey and Cyprus. Out with the 6th fleet from the Mediterranean

Down with the policies of exploitation and the impoverishment of the working class and popular masses

Stop the arms race! Do not let the sweat and the rights of the masses become the weapons of their slaughter!

Down with the policy of imperialist dependence Common struggle of our peoples for peace and independence!

 

KKE(μ-λ) Communist Party of Greece (marxist-leninist)
TKP/ML  Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist Leninist

April 2018

 

“No to War!” Greek Party calls for unity of Greek and Turkish peoples

Tensions that only serve imperialist interests are growing between Greece and Turkey.  The Communist Party of Greece (Marxist-Leninist) has issued a call for the Greek and Turkish peoples to unite against war.​ We reprint their statement below:

NO TO WAR!

PEOPLES ARE NOT CANNON FODDER OF THE IMPERIALISTS-MURDERERS!

The new dangerous naval incident involving the ramming of a Hellenic Coast Guard vessel in the vicinity of Imia islets, the announcements of military exercises and the subsequent reservation of marine areas, the airspace and maritime violations, and the escalation of threats once again underscore the increased perils of war that threaten both peoples of Greece and Turkey. These perils mostly spring out of the ferocious imperialistic enmity, that has transformed the area of Middle East and South-Eastern Mediterranean into an arena of a bloody game of influence and domination. Through interventions, stirring up of local reactionary contradictions, chauvinism, and redrawing of borders mostly in Syria, but not only there. The local bourgeoisie classes, reactionary regimes, as well as all region’s governments are being dragged in and manipulated in this ferocious enmity. They exchange the roles of aggressor and defendant according to the changes of balance of great powers and the strategical plans of imperialistic staffs.

The latest events prove that NATO not only doesn’t guarantee peace and security but is also an element of destabilization that brings war perils for our people. Just as it is for the rest of the peoples in Balkans and Southeastern Mediterranean. The Greek government, following and enhancing the American-NATO line, has dragged the country deeper into greater danger.

• By granting full freedom to the American military forces through their bases and accommodations, especially the one in Souda, Crete.
• Through the alignment to NATO’s orders in the Balkans, and especially in the framework of relations/contradictions with the Former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia.
• With the enhancement of the political-military relations and the so-called axes of reactionary regimes in the region of S.E. Mediterranean, especially with the incendiary of war and conqueror-state of Israel.
• In its coordination with the far-reaching plans of the western multinational oil and natural gas companies the presence of whom has been historically proven to almost always be connected to the incitement of contradictions, unjust wars, and abundance of peoples’ spilled blood.
• Through the utilization of the reactionary agreements of European Union and Turkey regarding the refugee issue, transforming the Aegean Sea to NATO Sea and with hopes to enhance their role.

 

Nothing of the above guarantees peace, security, and prosperity to the people and the new generation. On the contrary, it portends new sacrifices, new billion-euro armament programs, new nationalist deceptive campaigns of blind hatred towards the neighboring peoples, new disasters!

On the opposite shores of Aegean Sea, in Turkey, the fascist regime guised in a parliamentary cloak, and with the support of all the bourgeoise parties already wages two wars. The first one (and the long-term one) is against the Turkish people, the liberties, and the democratic rights, but also against Kurds of South-Eastern Turkey. Towns and villages are being bombed, political adversaries, academics, and journalists are being imprisoned, tortured, and silenced. The heroic Turkish revolutionary Left, which with a heavy cost resists the fascism and chauvinism, is being hunted down. Only today, 14/2, the authorities have enforced an unprecedented curfew in 176 villages and municipalities in Diyarbakir!

The second war is the invasion in the Kurdish territories of the Northern Syria, which today are centered in Afrin, yesterday in the Northern Iraq, infringing every sense of international law. Just like all the other bourgeoisie classes in the area, the Turkish bourgeoisie aims to obtain an important regional role, to be favored by the imperialist element, to exploit the contradictions, and to avoid any rifts on the cusp of a new circle of sharing and re-sharing of the Middle East, its borders and its sources of wealth.

The working class, the new generation, and the people must not stand indifferent in front of the perspective of these nightmarish events. They must revolt against NATO’s war plans and the policy of the government which serves them.

• To resist to every power which seeks to redraw borders with the blood of peoples.
• To demand that all the treaties which define borders and at the same time all the liberties and rights of peoples and minorities are respected.
• To stand against nationalism, chauvinism, and the cries of hatred for neighboring peoples.
• To struggle for Greece to leave NATO and the European Union, to boot out the American bases, and to topple down the policy of war-friendly axes with Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt.
• To denounce the plans of bisection of Cyprus and its transformation into a NATO’s aircraft-carrier.
• To protest the imperialist’s and their multinational energy companies’ bloody politics of stirring up the contradictions.
CPG(m-l) calls upon every working, democratic, and peaceful person to take a side, to mobilize, and to fight to block the war developments that loom on the horizon. First and mostly fighting against the politics of the imperialists and the government that serves them!

• NO TO ANY CHANGE OF BORDERS!
• FRIENDSHIP AND SOLIDARITY OF PEOPLES AND NATIONS OF THE REGION
• OUT WITH THE USA-NATO-EU-RUSSIA FROM THE BALKANS AND THE MIDDLE EAST!
• DOWN WITH THE GOVERNMENT POLITICS OF DEPENDENCE AND SUBMISSION
• NO TOLERANCE TO THE ENMITIES AND OPPORTUNISM OF THE RULLING CLASSES
• NO TO FASCISM, NATIONALISM, AND CHAUVINISM!

Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Greek referendum will sharpen contradictions, not resolve them

Bill F

Regardless of the result, the referendum in Greece serves to mark a further point at which the contradiction between the mass of Greek people and the European masters of imperialism becomes even more antagonistic.

The economic and financial arm of European imperialism has, until recently, operated mainly through the “troika”, a three-headed monster (European Commission, International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank) which has imposed a series of vicious austerity measures on the Greek people in order to pay off the “troika’s” onerous ‘bail-out’ loan conditions. Now their dirty work has been overtaken by the political leaders of European imperialism, Merkel and Hollande, and their Finance Ministers. This points to a political agenda that goes beyond financial greed. 

The accumulated debt is not the fault of the Greek working people, but rather the result of corrupt politicians, government officials and an elite section of the big bourgeoisie that paid little or no tax at all. This class of robbers and parasites collaborated with the imperialist masters of Germany and France to cut government jobs and services, bankrupt public education and healthcare, slash pensions and hard-won working conditions and systematically impoverish the Greek people.

In fact, as a result of these conditions, the ability of the Greek government to raise capital and pay off the accrued loans has now been called “unsustainable” by the IMF, yet there is no let-up in the demands of imperialism that the debts must be re-paid. They demand more job cuts, more privatisations, more austerity, unemployment and misery. Concessions and compromises by the Tsipras government have been brushed aside. Only the abject surrender of Greek sovereignty to imperialism would do.

So, after some confusion and vacillation, the Tsipras government has called a referendum on accepting or rejecting the latest austerity package of European imperialism, hoping a ‘No’ vote would shore up its negotiating position and lead to some relaxation of austerity rather than intensification.

No hope! The imperialist masters are hell-bent on ramming through their program and now have the further objective of toppling Tsipras and the Syriza government. Whether ‘No’ or ‘Yes’ the imperialists feel compelled to smash Greece and set this as an example to other countries that might want to assert some independence, such as Spain, Portugal or Italy where the working masses are also tiring of the rule of monopoly capitalism. In support of this objective the imperialists and their local collaborators have used all sorts of lies, rumours, fear-mongering and provocations to de-rail the ‘No’ vote.

The ruthless attacks have only served to incense and mobilise many sections of the people, but especially the youth who can see no future under this domination. Whatever happens in the aftermath of the referendum, the struggle against imperialist domination will continue to grow and the movement for national anti-imperialist independence will continue to build.

Communists and revolutionary activists are in the thick of this struggle, preparing the people for the next stage, building mutual support systems and inspiring confidence. While socialism is not on the immediate agenda, the level of political consciousness will change rapidly as experience unfolds and the struggle intensifies.

Unmentioned and unremarked by journalists and commentators on the situation in Greece is the role of the state apparatus, the police and military, and the history of their fascist coup in 1967. They enjoy close links with European imperialism through the NATO war machine, and with US imperialism which has a naval base in the South, supplies Greece with weapons, and has access to Greek military bases.

Greece: Syriza and the “troika”

Bill F.

Greece is a developed country long dominated by imperialism, and in recent times, particularly by the economic domination of European imperialism expressed through Germany and the ‘troika’ with their austerity measures which impose great suffering on the people. The “troika” consists of the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund and the European Central Bank. There is also the extensive presence of US imperialism with naval and air forces stationed in the country to serve US strategic interests in the region. 

 

The Greek people have a long history of struggle for their liberty and national independence, against foreign occupation, against fascism, against the violence of the bourgeois state. As a consequence of these harsh struggles and the painstaking mass work of revolutionary communists and their allies, the working class and significant sections of the people have heightened their political consciousness and intensified their resistance to imperialism. This process has accelerated in the past few years of fierce struggle against the ‘troika’ austerity cuts.

 

Whilst the clear identification of imperialist finance capital as the main enemy of the Greek people, and of the “troika” as the target of the current stage of the struggle, reflected a heightening of the political understanding of the Greek people, the focus on the Greek parliament as the arena for the conduct of that struggle is an indication that the ideological level is still not high enough to carry the movement in a genuinely revolutionary direction. There still remains to be developed an active vanguard force capable of convincing the masses that it is not enough to capture, through elections, the parliamentary machine and the apparatus of the state, but that this apparatus needs to be destroyed and replaced by proletarian institutions of state power.  

The election of Syriza to government reflected the surging anti-imperialist sentiments among the people. Syriza was carried to parliamentary office by a popular movement that was able to mobilise workers, students, farmers, small business, professional workers and the unemployed, bringing them together in a united front with the common objective of opposing, resisting and rejecting the imperialist agenda of the ‘troika’.

 

This ‘united front’ also included several ‘left’ groups that were prepared to work within the popular movement and cooperate around this common objective so as to try and raise the ideological level of the participants. Some, such as the KOE, which had done good political mass work in building the united front, were subsequently absorbed into the Syriza organisation. It remains to be seen what the comrades of the KOE can achieve from this. This will be regarded by many as a mistake, as the initiative and independence of communist organisation was surrendered. Mao referred to the error of “all unity and no struggle” in the context of the united front

 

Others, including the KKE, remained outside and continued to campaign separately. The KKE refused to join the broader movement that was forming around Syriza and held separate rallies and meetings of its own supporters. In the context of the united front, it was objectively a position of “all struggle and no unity” and effectively isolated the KKE from having influence over the broader united front. In the election, its share of the vote increased only marginally to a bit over 5%.  

 

The smaller parties, the KKE (ML) and ML-KKE cooperated in the election campaign period and this may continue. 

    

Since then the new government has backed down on its campaign commitments, and agreed in the February negotiations with key agents of European imperialism, to accepting the austerity measures and repayment conditions of the November 2012 agreement (signed with the previous Samaras government) in return for a short extension of the ‘bailout’ monies.

 

This is a major setback to the hopes and confidence of the suffering Greek people who had hailed the new government in massive street demonstrations in the days preceding the negotiations.

 

The back-down raises questions – to what extent was it forced because of the government’s immediate cash-flow crisis (exacerbated by money being transferred out of the country, by falling bank deposits, by rampant tax evasion by the rich)? A tactical retreat in the face of overwhelming odds?

 

Did it buy time to move forward with progressive policies or was it a totally opportunist sell-out as denounced by the KKE?

 

Would the consequences of alternatives, such as nationalising the key industries, seizing the assets of the big tax evaders, breaking from the European Union, trigger a coup by the fascist-backed military?

 

Would a stronger position have been taken if there had been a greater communist influence within Syriza and the united front?

 

These questions and others will probably be answered in the months ahead. In times of economic and political crisis, the situation can change rapidly. What is certain is that the anti-imperialist struggle will continue and that class struggle will intensify within and beyond the united front and the Syriza government.

 

The CPA (M-L) has been very much interested in the unfolding situation in Greece and the experience of building the united front, as Australia is also a developed country dominated by imperialism.  

Austerity: an academic word for human suffering

Vanguard October 2012 p. 11
Bill F.

(Above, mass protest against austerity measures in Thessalonika)

The governments of modern imperialism are all promoting the concept of ‘austerity’ as a solution to the global capitalist economic crisis. Just what this ‘austerity’ really means for working people can be seen in the experience of Greece.

Since the June election of the shameless coalition (New Democracy-PASOK-Democratic Left) the European imperialists, led by Germany, have spelled out even more demands on this feeble government to exploit and suppress the Greek people.

(Above, Greek municipal workers protesting austerity measures) 

Among other measures, the ‘troika’ of the European Commission, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund has demanded “… increase flexibility of work schedules: increase the number of maximum workdays to six days per week for all sectors… Set the minimum daily rest to 11 hours; delink the working hours of employees from the opening hours of the establishment; eliminate restrictions on minimum/maximum time between morning and afternoon shifts; allow the consecutive two-week leave to be taken any time during the year in seasonal sectors.”

In addition, they are demanding a six-day working week in return for a second bailout, and for the national labour inspectorate to be placed under European supervision to enforce their anti-worker policies. They also demand €3.5 billion cut to pensions, €1.47 billion cut to healthcare, with a token €517 million cut from defence.

(Above, Greek pensioners protest) 

Clearly, it is the working people who must carry the load. It really means human suffering for the majority – fewer jobs, starvation wages and impoverished retirement, lack of healthcare services, stunted education, and shattered dreams for the young.

There are no demands for the rich and powerful to open their wallets. No, it is the working people who are blamed for the problem – they’ve had it too good for too long, so say the imperial masters and their stooges! Yet it is the same greedy crew that caused the general capitalist economic crisis in the first place!

When the auditors from the IMF, EU and European Central Bank arrived in Greece recently, to assess progress in implementing their ‘austerity’ scheme prior to releasing further ‘bailout’ monies, they only stayed one hour; just enough to deliver their orders, not enough to hear the pain and suffering of the Greek people, and not enough to face their anger.

As the Greek crisis continues, so does the struggle against the dictates of imperialism, with many thousands marching in protest through Thessaloniki in early September.

Australians are getting our own taste of what to expect from the servants of imperialism, as state governments in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Western Australia are all singing the same austerity song.

For working people, the song is quite different: “Make the rich pay!”

(Above,Spanish  anti-austerity marchers take to the streets of Madrid)