Last week, once again, a trial based on empty accusations was held in the court of Mytilini. 13 people accused of occupying public spaces and resisting authority have been tried, two years after the events themselves.
In the autumn of 2017, police violently put an end to a six week occupation denouncing terrible conditions in Moria camp. The protestors were charged, in the face of excessive police action against them. Now, twelve have been deservedly acquitted of the charges brought against them by police, and the thirteenth given a three month sentence for resisting authority.
NBK supported the defendants two years ago at the protest, and also these last days with food during the preparation and on the day of the trial.
This trial, against people who protest against the inhumane living conditions and asylum procedure on the Aegean Islands, is no isolated case. Just last May there was a trial against 122 people, arrested on Saphus Square in April 2018, after severe attacks by fascists while police watched.
In both cases, after several hours of testifying in court, the court declared them innocent beyond all doubt. Once again the Greek police, their commanders, and their lines of action were not only left in question, but dragged completely though the mud. There are enough occasions already when their actions have been put into doubt by the courts.
In so many trials, it has been painfully obvious that the prosecutor and the police cannot present any valid evidence, that actually there is no case, that no one should have gone to court, that no one should have spent months in prison for their actions… That instead, the police should examine their actions in the face of these protests, which are protected by the Greek Constitution. That these actions ought to set off alarm bells, for the state and whole society.
We denounce the habitual actions of the police towards these people who protest against their treatment by the authorities. We can recall so much repression against protests in Moria. We do not recall any actions in their favour or even in their defence, only actions against the protesters.
This comes as no surprise, when the police (already a repressive body, defending the interests of the established power and not of the people who suffer from it) are infiltrated by Nazis, which happens not only in Greece, but in many European states now. It follows that this repression, even in the face of peaceful protests, is what people face day to day in Lesvos and in other islands of the Aegean Sea.
We do not resign ourselves to accept as everyday the habitual criminalization of protests and solidarity, the persecution of migrants who seek refuge and are protesting for their rights in a dehumanizing context, and the persecution of people in solidarity. We will continue to fight against these actions, and denounce the savage repression.
We know that all this is being ‘normalized’ in the subconsciousness of many people, here and in the whole of Europe. We know that these actions have the protection of the European Union’s rules, regulations and course of action on migration. We know that European right-wing, far-right, fascist and Nazi groups (acting from political parties, military, police, paramilitary and parapolice corps) take advantage of these ideological lines marked in pursuit of security (a security for hetero-patriarchal capitalism, not for us) to attack the different and the dissidents.
We will not stop denouncing this criminalization and shouting to the citizens of Europe, to wake up and rise up against oppression.
To fight to resist current European political lines, to respect all people and protect everyone’s dignity and freedom.
Stop show trials!
Close all hotspots!
No human is illegal!
Open The Borders!