Rogue Media

By: Stavros Panagiotidis

“They are not frightening us, they are just making us furious!”

The so-called negotiations between the Greek Government and the Troika (European Union – International Monetary Fund – European Central Bank) have come to the prescribed result. A cut on the minimum wage of 22% (and up to 40% for the rest), which means that people in Greece will have to live on a 400 Euro monthly income, combined with a 15% cut on the already extremely low pensions and the dismissal of 150.000 public servants, has been decided.

The announcement of the governments’ intentions created waves of rage in Greece and the General Confederation of Trade Unions called for a 48-hour strike. On Sunday, the day of the voting procedure, an enormous demonstration took place. Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators flooded all the streets around the Parliament. The provocative action on the side of the police forces (along with the propaganda of dominant media saying that the people gathered were not more than 20,000!) proved the governments’ fear of the people’s reactions and its decision to destroy the demonstration and terrorize the citizens. The first task was accomplished when police forces, after hours of terrorizing attacks against people in the nearby streets, without any excuse attacked the main body of the demonstration shooting gas bombs inside the blocks, causing many people to faint out, get injured or even suffer suffocation for a few moments. More than 50 demonstrators went to the hospitals, injured or with respiratory problems and once again the Internet was flooded with videos showing the police’s illegal actions. Read the rest of this entry →

Numerous buildings were burned during the clashes in central Athens on Sunday. (PANAYIOTIS TZAMAROS/REUTERS) )

Fires raged in Athens overnight with reports that more than 40 buildings had been set ablaze in a violent response to the Greek parliament’s passage of an unpopular austerity package negotiated with its European creditors – the EU, ECB, and IMF – in exchange for a tranche of new bailout funds.

Reuters reports:

Cinemas, cafes, shops and banks were set ablaze in central Athens and black-masked protesters fought riot police outside parliament before lawmakers voted on the package that demands deep pay, pension and job cuts — the price of a 130 billion euro ($172 billion) bailout needed to keep the country afloat.

State television reported the violence spread to the tourist islands of Corfu and Crete, the northern city of Thessaloniki and towns in central Greece. Police said 150 shops were looted in the capital and 34 buildings set ablaze.

Altogether 199 of the 300 lawmakers backed the bill, but 43 deputies from the two parties in the government of Prime Minister Lucas Papademos, the socialists and conservatives, rebelled by voting against It. They were immediately expelled by their parties. [...]

The rebellion and street violence foreshadowed the problems the Greek government faces in implementing the cuts, which include a 22 percent reduction in the minimum wage — a package critics say condemns the economy to an ever-deeper downward spiral.

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