Friday (12/19): reports from Greece

In the morning, the kids from the schools of Peristeri, where the second 16year old was shot 2 days ago, had a solidarity gathering and demonstration. Students also held a demonstration in Piraeus.
In the afternoon from 3pm till very late at night, a big open-air solidarity/benefit show at Propylea took place. More than 30 artists and bands were playing and thousand of people attended.
Some photos of the show: http://athens.indymedia.org/front.php3?lang=el&article_id=950727#951302
Around midday, 20-40 people attacked the French Cultural Institute in Athens and a nearby bank and wrote slogan on the walls such as: "Spark in Athens. Fire in Paris. Insurrection is coming" and "France, Greece, uprising everywhere". This act was in solidarity with the arrestees there (accused for solidarity acts and sabotage of the railways) and the French students who are in the streets too these days.
In the evening, in Aigaleo, 100 anarchists demonstrated. They broke many bank windows and their surveillance cameras, wrote slogans on the walls and attacked the two riot squads in front of the local police station.
Moreover, during the premier of a play in a central theater, 40 people got on stage and unfolded a banner that read “Everyone on the streets, Free all the arrested now”. They left shortly after while some of the attendants applauded.

A demonstrations took place in Lamia and a gathering in Larissa.
In Chania, a group of 50 people occupied a local tv station and played a 20 minute long video about the killing and the events that are following and then left.
In Giannena a solidarity show took place. In the same city, during the small hours of Friday, two banks were attacked, one of which inside the university.
Arson attacks also happened in Kavala and Aigio. Two cars were set alight in Thessaloniki and two in Patras.

Some major news-websites today insist that one of the cars burnt in Patras is the car of Athanasios Melistas, the cop which shot in the back of the head and killed the 15 year Mihali Kalteza at Exarchia in 1985. The killing was followed by heavy riots and social revolt, just like today and the cop then was set free by the “justice” system. For 2 decades now rumors are going around about where Melistas is, some say that he had left the country. If the car was his and if he now lives in Patras is still unknown.

The students don't seem to plan to go back to the classrooms any time soon. According to OLME (the syndicate of school teachers), 800 schools across the country are occupied by the pupils.

The tactic that the police follows in every demonstration is the same: They throw large amounts of chemical gas and when the protesters and passersby try to escape from the gas, struggling to get some air, the riot squads attack and arrest anybody. Usually the ones who get arrested are not the fighting ones but those who stayed behind because they know that they've done nothing wrong. But the cops don't care about that. Later the cops agree with each other and give identical testifies against the arrestees, saying that they were caught while throwing rocks and molotov coctails. The charges held against the arrestees are very severe and are not based on any evidence, just on the false testifies by the cops. One of the victims of this tactic, was arrested after the demonstration yesterday in Athens. The 23 year old man was arrested and heavily beaten by the cops (he was carried to the hospital later) and he is now facing severe felony charges. This is one of the hundreds similar cases but the difference is that the man mentioned is doing his military (mandatory for every greek man). There are at least 3 eyewitnesses which are saying that he was just observing the fights and he was trying to get away from the chemicals that the cops threw when he was arrested and brutally beaten.

During the big demonstration yesterday, photographers caught the riot police spraying with teargas an elderly passerby lady: http://katalipsisxolistheatrou.blogspot.com/2008/12/blog-post_19.html

Photos of the big concert that took place in Thessaloniki on Thursday: http://katalipsisxolistheatrou.blogspot.com/2008/12/blog-post_952.html