Joke of the year: Erdogan will receive a.... "peace award"!

This could be, without doubt, the best joke of the year. According to a soL international report, the International Pediatric Association (IPA) announced on March 11 that it would give the ‘International Peace Award’ to Turkey’s warmongering President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for helping refugee children! 

The award came after the IPA officials visited the refugee camps in Turkey. Announcing the IPA decision, Kerem Hasanoğlu, the head of the association’s external relations department, said that the association decided to award Erdoğan for his government’s role in the services regarding the refugee children.

Statement of the KKE on International Migrants Day - بمناسبة اليوم العالمي للمهاجر

On the occasion of International Migrants Day, the KKE expresses its solidarity and support for the refugees and economic migrants living in our country, as well as Greek immigrants living and working abroad. It calls upon them to organize and struggle in the ranks of the class-oriented labour movement to join with the KKE:

- Defending and expanding their labour, social and democratic rights

KKE: "The 65.6 million refugees are victims of a system that brings war, horror and death"

Giant banners raised by the KKE at the
Acropolis, in support of the refugees, Oct. 2015.

In a statement regarding the World Refugee Day, the Press Office of the CC of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) points out the following:

"The 65.6 million refugees and domestically displaced people are not just a "humanitarian crisis". It is the tragic confirmation of the actual character of a system which, when it cannot give solutions to its contradictions by crushing peoples' rights, resorts to war sowing horror, death and refugees. The imperialist war crushes whatever imperialist peace leaves intact. 

The SYRIZA-ANEL government, which cultivates the myth of the supposedly humanitarian stance towards the refugees, isn't innocent. It is responsible for the entrapment of 62,000 refugees in (mainland) Greece and the double entrapment- under miserable conditions- in the islands. It brought the special NATO naval force in the Aegean, using the refugees and immigrants as a pretext. It gives 2.4% of the GDP, 4 billion euros every year- stealing from workers, unemployed, pensioners, young people- to the murderous NATO machine. 

Communist Youths in Thessaloniki: "Solidarity with the refugees. Our enemy is capitalism"

Singing the 'Internationale' with the fists raised.

In a political event held in Thessaloniki, Greece on Saturday afternoon, communist youth organisations from six countries (Greece, Turkey, Spain, Italy, Serbia and Germany) declared their internationalist solidarity to the refugees. The event was organised by the Communist Youth of Greece (KNE) and was attended by representatives of five communist youths:

The Socialist German Workers Youth; The Collective of Communist Youths - Spain ; The Young Communists Front - Italy; The League of Yugoslav Communist Youth- Serbia and the Communist Youth of Turkey.

KKE: Statement on the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination

On the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the Press Office of the CC of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) issued the following statement:

"Fifty-one years after the proclamation by the UN, with the decisive contribution of the Soviet Union, of the 21^st of March as the International Day against Racial Discrimination, the capitalist world, in the USA, the EU, in Greece, is showing more and more clearly its inhuman character against refugees and immigrants, to the victims of imperialist wars and capitalist exploitation.

Shocking conditions for refugees as winter cold and snow cover settled over Greece - Question by the KKE in the Parliament asking for immediate measures

Freezing temperatures and heavy snowfall are making life even harder for thousands of refugees living in limbo across Greece. Migration Policy Minister Yiannis Mouzalas admitted that the situation on the islands due to the sub-zero temperatures is not acceptable but suggested that the main reason for this is that locals have obstructed plans to expand reception facilities so migrants can be moved out of the hotspots, where some are housed in tents. 

"The UN Refugee Agency is today reiterating its call to accelerate the moving of asylum seekers from the Aegean islands to the Greek mainland," spokesman Adrian Edwards said last Friday in Geneva. "The need for better protection will become all the more acute this weekend when temperatures on the islands are expected to drop. We are worried."

KKE: Statement regarding PM Tsipras' remarks on the refugee-migrant crisis

Regarding the speech of Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras at the 71st UN General Assembly- and his remarks on the refugee crisis- the Press Office of the CC of the Communist Party of Greece issued the following statement:

"The Prime Minister not only didn't find a word to say about the real causes and those responsible for the wars and the refugee crisis in our region, but, furthermore, he justified the violation of the refugees' rights and of the Geneva Convention by adopting the arguments of the imperialist staffs about the "maintaining of social cohesion" and "public safety".

However, the refuge isn't a natural phenomenon; it is caused by the imperialist war, the antagonisms between the powerful ones, the poverty that capitalist exploitation creates.

Hate, Bigotry, Racism: The 'Jihadists' of the Greek Orthodox Church

SPECIAL TO IN DEFENSE OF COMMUNISM.

This is not a post about religion and faith. Historical materialism, as it has been analyzed in the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin and others, represents our perspective on the “opium of the people”. However, this article focuses on the Greek Orthodox Church as an institution and her high ranking representatives. Before going to our major issue, let us remind the following: a) according to article 3.1 of the Constitution of Greece (Hellenic Republic) “the prevailing religion in Greece is that of the Eastern Orthodox Church of Christ”, b) the Church of Greece is, in fact, an institution tied to the bourgeois Greek state, as long as priests (of all ranks) are civil servants and their salaries are paid from the State. c) the Church of Greece, with an estate of billion euros, is largely benefited by a series of tax exemptions.

The reactionary and regressive role of the Church of Greece through history is, more or less, known. Since the formation of the independent Greek state in 1830, the Orthodox Church has been always part of the establishment- from the Ottoman rule to the formation of the Kingdom of Greece and from the 1940s Nazi occupation to the 1967-1974 military dictatorship, the leadership of the Greek Orthodox Church played its role as a staunch ally of the established order. 

Communist Party of Greece (KKE): Statement for the World Refugee Day

Source: 902.gr / Translation: In Defense of Communism.

On the occasion of the World Refugee Day, the Press Office of the CC of KKE issued the following statement:

"The UN data for 2015- with the unprecedented number of 65.3 million refugees and domestically displaced people, 50% of which are children and 5.4 million people who became refugees for first time in 2015- is the mirror of a system which the only that has to offer is crises, poverty, wars, uprooting and refugees. The (the data) also show that if people do not put their own stamp, targeting the actual responsible, the monopolies and the imperialist war, the millions of the persecuted and uprooted people will be increasing every year.

What is the actual role of the NGOs in Greece's Refugee Crisis?

What is the role of the NGOs?

Source: Rizospastis / Translation: In Defense of Communism.

In Rizospastis' travelogue in refugee camps around the country, which started on May 29, there are shocking information about the entrapment, the miserable living conditions, the wounds that the war has left to thousands of people. This journalistic travelogue will continue in the following days, in an effort to highlight all the aspects of the refugee-immigration question. 

One aspect, for example, is what is happening with the so-called "Non-Governmental Organisations" (NGOs), which literally have the total control inside the refugee camps, operating as "state within the state". The government has left in their hands the infrastructures (which host refugees), while- along with the EU- provides to these NGOs financial aid of many million euros. Various organisations have taken control of all services. From the feeding sector to the entertainment of the refugee children. From Ellinikon to Ritsona, in Larisa and in Central Macedonia. 

War and Refugees in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. The dangerous role of the EU and NATO

Imperialists Collide: War and Refugees in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. The dangerous role of the EU and NATO.

Remarks of Kostas Papadakis, Member of the European Parliament (MEP) and member of the CC of KKE, at the panel organised by the site Marxism-Leninism Today, at the Left Forum John Jay College, City University of New York, May 21, 2016.

We would like to thank Marxism-Leninism Today for the opportunity afforded to us to hold a discussion today, here in New York, on serious issues related to the struggle of the KKE (Communist Party of Greece), specifically our internationalist struggle. Greece and the USA may be separated by thousands of miles, but our goal and ambition is for communists and radical militants to form unified criteria in terms of examining the developments and organizing the struggle for the interests of the working class.

Our tool for this must be our worldview, Marxism-Leninism, which provides us with the capacity to draw the necessary conclusions regarding the causes and development of complex issues that mark the era of the highest stage of capitalism, imperialism. Above all, communists at an international level must form a unified revolutionary strategy against a ruthless and powerful enemy, the capitalist system. This is not a task for a distant and undefined future. It is something absolutely necessary in today's conditions. Its absence leaves its mark on the developments, makes it difficult for the workers and the poor popular strata on both sides of the Atlantic to understand that the capitalist system is their real enemy, to recognize its objective laws and the methods it uses to achieve its goal, which is none other than the safeguarding of the maximum profitability possible and its own perpetuation as a system.

Mikis Theodorakis: The Pope, the predators and the hunted

Legendary composer Mikis Theodorakis, 91.

The Pope, the predators and the hunted.

By Mikis Theodorakis.

Translation from Greek: In Defense of Communism.

I am watching in live broadcast the visit of the Pope, the Religious Leader of the majority of Europe's people in Lesvos, where tens of thousands victims from Syria and other Middle East countries- who defying death and leaving behind dozens of drowned, especially children- arrived from Turkey.

Who is responsible for that big tragedy that millions of innocent fellow humans are living today?

It is the Black Death that the US and Europe's states, which have war industries, are exporting. How many thousands houses, schools, hospitals and other infrastructures were demolished, how many million people were killed or injured and how many of them were uprooted from their countries and forced to search a foreign refuge because of the weapons made by the hands of Europeans and Americans...

Here it is the splendor, the big crime of our era with the modern victimizers-predators from the one side and their victims-quarries from the other. The big crime which transforms our era into a Jungle and the uncountable hypocrisy of the supposedly civilized European People who seal their countries with wire, like the Nazis were doing with the numerous Auschwitz, Dachau and Mauthausen. With the difference (being) that, this time, the victimizers are inside and the victims are out.

KKE: Comment on the situation of the refugees in Idomeni

Source: 902.gr / Translation: In Defense of Communism.

In a comment regarding the ongoing developments in Idomeni, the Press Bureau of the CC of KKE stresses the following:

"The complete lack, for months now, of any kind of state responsibility in Idomeni - as a result of the refugees' entrapment agreement signed between the SYRIZA-ANEL government and the EU - is the basic factor which leads thousands of refugees to despair and desperation, thus leaving space for the unaccountable activity of various suspicious NGOs which, under the mantle of "solidarity", are playing games of domestic and foreign powers on the shoulders of refugees. On the same time, that (situation) becomes an allibi for violence and repression from the side of FYROM's government which is alligned with the aspirations of imperialist states and organisations like NATO and the EU.

VIDEO: Golden Dawn's Neo-Nazi thugs attack TV crew in Piraeus

       

A Neo-Nazi wearing a Golden Dawn t-shirt attacks the crew of E TV channel during clashes in Piraeus. The attack occured during Golden Dawn members' clash with anti-fascist demonstrators- the Nazi Party had staged an anti-refugee gathering a few minutes earlier. 

Denunciation of Golden Dawn's fascist anti-refugee gathering in Piraeus

Source: 902.gr

Translation: In Defense of Communism.

The local organisation of KKE in Piraeus condemns the fiesta staged by Golden Dawn and calls the working class and the people of the area to reject the fascists's new preaching of hate.

Golden Dawn members gathered outside the Municipal Theatre of Piraeus shouting "against the islamization" of the country, while an anti-fascist rally had been scheduled to take place just on the opposite Korais square. There were clashes between the Neo-Nazis and anarchists and a man from Golden Dawn's block- holding an iron bar- attacked a tv crew. Despite the intervention of police he avoided arrest.

The KKE organisation of Piraeus issued an announcement in which, among others, it states (we underline the most interesting points):

The SYRIZA-ANEL government ratified the wretched bargain of the EU with Turkey's ruling class

         

(VIDEO from PAME's rally in support of the refugees in Athens)

Republished from inter.kke.gr.

On the 1^st of April 2016, the draft law related to the ratification of the European Union’s agreement with Turkey on the issue of refugees and immigrants was discussed and passed in the Greek parliament. All the reactionary EU decisions from September 2015 to its most recent Summit that have been co-signed to by the SYRIZA-ANEL government were integrated into Greek legislation in this way.

The European bourgeois states adjust- in a more reactionary direction- their legislation on asylum and regarding those who are entitled to international protection in line with these decisions. This is in complete contradiction to International Law regarding refugees, despite the hypocritical references to and invocations of the Geneva Convention.

Greek parliament discussion on draft law for the refugees- ΚΚΕ: "You ask from the murderer to solve the problem"

KKE's parliamentary rep., MP Thanasis Pafilis.

The fact that the SYRIZA-ANEL coalition government brings with fast-track procedure the draft law for the refugees- and on the same time adds more than 100 technical legislative issues- is unacceptable and serves other purposes said Thanasis Pafilis, the parliamentary representative of the Communist Party of Greece.

Refering to the causes of the refugee issue- taking into account that during their speeches the MPs of SYRIZA and New Democracy refered to various causes- Pafilis said that all of them voted and supported NATO's decision for a 'New Middle East' that was taken at the 2004 NATO summit in Istanbul. "When you signed the plan or when you supported it when it was submitted to the European Parliament, didn't you know what the outcome would be?" asked Pafilis. The KKE MP also added that only the Communist Party had then opposed these plans thus receiving-then- the accusations from the New Democracy, PASOK as well as from SYRIZA.

Communist Youth of Greece (KNE): Capitalism generates crises, wars, refugees! We struggle to overthrow it!

Announcement of KNE on the refugees' issue.

Source: int.kne.gr

In recent months we witness the drama of thousands of refugees and migrants, who, expelled from their lands, are seeking a better life.

EU-NATO and governments that support them over time:

- Uproot peoples from their homelands by war

- Now with their decisions, they entrap them in our country although they want to go to other countries

War, repression, profits for the few:

These were always the values ​​of the EU!

Join Statement of Communist and Workers Parties

We, the communist and workers parties, that sign this text:

 We denounce the imperialist aggressiveness, the interventions and wars, the USA, NATO and the EU and their "allies", like Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. The criminal activity of these powers has caused millions of people to become refugees and immigrants.

All the bourgeois governments which have been participating all these years with armies, providing every kind of assistance and reproducing all the pretexts used to justify the unleashing of these imperialist interventions also bear serious responsibilities.

 We denounce the EU and the bourgeois governments that follow a line of police-military repression of the refugees, who are trying to escape war, destitution and the human trafficking networks.

The positions of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) on the refugee-immigrant question

A Syrian refugee in Idomeni, Greece.
REUTERS/Yannis Behrakis.

Source: inter.kke.gr

The GS of the CC of the KKE, Dimitris Koutsoumpas, during the meeting of the political leaders called by the President of the Republic on the refugee question last Friday (4/3/2016) submitted a paper with the full and elaborated positions of the party on the specific issue.

“1.The KKE, from the very first moment of the sharpening of the refugee-immigration issue, attempted to explain its causes to the Greek people, which are the wars and interventions unleashed by the USA, NATO and the EU in the wider region of the Middle East, the Eastern Mediterranean, North Africa, in the framework of their competition with other forces, like Russia.

2. Needless to say the people who are victims of wars, interventions and reactionary regimes have the right to seek a safer life in other countries, despite the fact that a permanent solution to the problem can be found if the people of each country organize and struggle to overthrow the system that creates wars, poverty and refugees.