Oprøret breder sig: 50.000 mennesker blokerer det græske parlament

Fra Occupied London:

According to corporate media and blogs, about 50,000 people participated in the rally in Syntagma Square [on May 31, 2011]. Thousands of people still there at the moment. Earlier the rally surrounded the parliament and a lot of demonstrators blockaded the gates. According to corporate media, police hesitated to attack to the people who blockaded the entries out of fear for riots from such a large crowd of people. So several MPs who had been trapped in the parliament had to leave the building from the back door through the national garden, while others had to leave the parliament after midnight, when the gates were not blockaded any more. People who noticed the ‘escaping’ MPs start chanting ‘thieves!’ ‘thieves!’. Earlier, professors of the University of Athens gave public speeches on the Propylea of the university in front of thousands people, supporting the rally of Syntagma. The speakers and the crowd marched from Propylea to Syntagma and merged with the ongoing rally there, while the people’s assembly of Syntagma Sq. carried on for seventh night.

Demonstrationerne i Grækenland er flammet op efter inspiration fra de store demonstrationer i Spanien, fortæller Wikipedia:

As of May 25, 2011, there is a peaceful demonstration in Athens and other major cities, protesting the new austerity measures proposed by the goverment, in the same spirit as the 2011 Spanish protests.[44][45][46] The demonstrations span across most major greek cities, including Athens, Thessaloniki, Larissa, Patras, Volos, Rethymno, Tripoli and Kalamata, some of Greece‘s largest cities.[47][48][49] The demonstration in Athens is coordinated by the Facebook page “Αγανακτισμένοι Στο Σύνταγμα” (Indignants at Syntagma).[50] Currently, it is reported that over 90,000 people have registered at the page,[51] and thousands (reportedly over 30,000)[45] have gathered outside the Greek Parliament in Syntagma square.[52][53] The demonstration in Greece‘s second-largest city, Thessaloniki, is co-ordinated by the facebook page “Αγανακτισμένοι στον Λευκό Πύργο” (Indignants at the White Tower), and over 35,000 people have said they would ‘attend’ the protest.[54] Some of the most popular slogans at the May 25 protest were:

  • Error 404, Democracy was not found.
  • I vote, You vote, He votes, She votes, We vote, You vote, They steal.
  • Greece your turn has come, you have to stop burying your children.[55]
  • Oust! (Greek interjection of a negative nature, meaning “leave”)
  • The maid resisted. What do we do? (Reference to an alleged sex scandal involving former IMF director Dominique Strauss-Kahn)[46]

(…) May 31 marked seven days since the start of the protests, and the University of Athens hosted an anti-government protest with the aid of famous Greek composer and anti-dictatorship fighter Mikis Theodorakis, while the dean of the University was also a key speaker at the event.[86] Once the protest at the university was over, the 10,000 protesters joined forces with the demonstrators already in front of the parliament.[87] The total number of demonstrators was between 25,000 and 50,000[87][88] and the demonstrators had surrounded the Greek parliament, making it impossible for MPs and workers inside the building to come out,[87][88] while 8 MPs were able to escape through the adjacent National Gardens.[88] Later riot police created a passage in order to enable MPs to exit the parliament, but the 1,000 protesters gathered at the side entrance of the parliament condemned all the members of parliament that exited the building.[89]

Wikipedia citerer mest græske kilder, jeg har desværre ikke fundet dækning af gårsdagens blokade af parlamentet på andet end græsk og spansk. Men mon ikke det kommer?

Debtocracy – gældsstyre


Debtocracy International Version by BitsnBytes

En vigtig græsk dokumentarfilm om den gældsfælde, som Grækenland er havnet i. Filmen er på græsk, men der er undertekster på engelsk (og fransk og spansk og portugisisk).

Den aktuelle græske gældskrise behandles med paralleller til Argentina og Ecuador. I Argentina endte en præsident, der havde solgt sin sjæl til IMF og Verdensbanken, med at forlade præsidentpaladset i helikopter. Han turde ikke gå ud af fordøren på grund af alle de vrede demonstranter. I Ecuador blev landet udplyndret af kreditorerne i årevis, indtil den nuværende præsident Rafael Correa fik nedsat en kommission af statsrevisorer, der kulegravede statsgælden og fandt ud af, at det meste af den var ugyldig.

Meget store dele af den græske udlandsgæld, som EU-kommissionen og IMF med bedemandsansigter insisterer på at få tilbagebetalt, er formentlig også ugyldig. Meget af den er blevet til efter åbenlys bestikkelse fra firmaer som Siemens og Goldman-Sachs. En af filmens pointer er netop, at der også i Grækenland burde foretages en grundig revision af hele gælden. En sådan revision ville formentlig medføre, at det meste af den græske udlandsgæld ganske enkelt blev fundet ulovlig eller ugyldig. Gribbene fra EU-kommissionen og Verdensbanken vil selvfølgelig kæmpe med næb og kløer mod en sådan revision.