Massive protest marches in Athens and Salonica in solidarity to squats

On Tuesday 29/04 protesters flooded the streets of Athens and Salonica, in coordinated mass protest marches in solidarity to squats and occupied public spaces. With slogans like "10, 100, 1000 squats against a world of organised boredom" and "nor with bulldozers nor with tanks can you evict the punks" protesters in Greece's two major cities defied the draconian police measures and mounting anti-anarchist media pressure, surpassing in numbers any previous anarchist protest march in the history of the republic.

In Athens the protest began from the liberated park in Exarcheia where two weeks ago two students were seriously injured during a brutal police raid. The march then passed from the Polytechneio and a series of occupied buildings in down town Athens before terminating after 5km to the liberated park of Kyprou and Patission. Limited skirmishes between protesters and riot police forces occurred only once during the march, while dozens of CCTV cameras, bank windows and ATMs were destroyed. A district office of the rampantly anti-anarchist Communist Party (KKE) was also attacked. After the end of the march, unprovoked riot police forces tried to stop a trolley bus linking the park with the Polytechnic carrying many protesters. Their attempts to terrorise the strugglers were hampered by their firm stance and bystanders' vocal condemnation.

The protest marches form the pinnacle of the solidarity campaign towards squats that have come under fire by the notorious "legal putschist" general persecutor Mr Sanidas since December's uprising. Besides ordering procedures of investigation and eviction against dozens of occupied buildings and public spaces, the government has also proclaimed a packet of anti-anarchist laws including the upgrading of breach of the peace (under which squatters are being persecuted) from a felony to a crime. The occupation of university buildings forms a long tradition in the country's revolutionary movement, while political squats have been a centerpiece of the anarchist struggle since the 1980s.