The greek bailout, the controlled bankruptcy and the police brutality

My dear friends abroad, I wrote an email trying to explain the recent events (28-29 June in Greece) about the new Midterm Loan Agreement, the Applicational lawbill, the audacity, arrogance and corruption of the two ruling parties of the major political scene and the Amnesty International condemned riot police forces. Because of the length of the text, the demand and the people I have omitted to send, I transferred the text and the comments to my blog. The text is in english. My apologies for not translating to other languages being capable of (Bulgarian and French). Please translate it in your native language and forward it.

As known, on June 29th 2011, the greek government brought a new lawbill which delivers the sume of Greece 's assets to private hands. This option was included as a condition in the Loan Facilitation Contract of May 8th, 2011. This contract was signed by a mere one minister alone, ex-finance minister Yorgos Papakonstantinou and never being brought to the Parliament. According to the Constitution of Greece, this agreement should be ratified by a 3/5 enhanced majority of the greek MPs (180 minimum favoring votes required), as the article 28 of the Greek Constitution commands for agreements concerning the country 's national sovereignity. The replacing finance minister, Evangelos Venizelos, before being assigned to his new post, stated 15 days ago that this lawbill should be approved by a 180 votes enhanced majority, a statement that has refrained of, since ever. This enhanced majority ratification never happened. The complete unconstitutionality of this action can be seen on the condition:

"Neither the Borrower nor any of its property are immune on the grounds of sovereignty or otherwise from jurisdiction, attachment – whether before or after judgement – or execution in respect of any action or proceeding relating to the Agreement."
(Loan Facilitation Contract, Annex 4, §12, page 26)

For the Greek-speaking friends abroad, the unveiling interview of Yorgos Kassimatis, a reknown constitutional rights professor and former legal advisor of the Prime Minister, in which he describes the frauds of greek government:
1/3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiPGY9NBHsE
2/3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sr6ahlNJvaw
3/3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qqyKxyCP_oY

All these elaborations, in practice, mean that the borrowers, (every private "investor", international organization, crook, etc.), can confiscate every asset belonging to the state as compensation and withdrawal from the right of any legal appealing objection from the greek state side. No matter whether this is Acropolis, an ore mine, oil field, a fighterjet or a nice beach.
Nothing is immune of confiscation.
Of course, as anybody knows, a usurer never wants his borrower to pay off, as he can suck his savings continuously. The same applies now: Greece has not been squeezed yet. Why should an investor buy any public infrastructure now for i.e. 7 billion euros, while after the forthcoming bankruptcy could be sold for a single euro? Vultures are patient: they fly and wait until the animal below has died.
The EU/IMF/ECB anxiety about Greece 's bankruptcy is simply fake: when the country's economy will have been brought to a Third World country 's condition, no investment-evaluation company will be anxious of a "credit incident", disrupting and destabilizing the world market of money transferring that makes these companies live. Nobody cares if Mauritania declared bankruptcy. So will happen here. (No offence please to the hard-struggling people of the afore-mentioned country, it is just an example).

Dear friends, please don' t underestimate the dangers. Don 't be fooled by just assuming that Greece has been brought to this situation because of the corruption (a real factor), or people 's lazyness (a common stereotype for the southern europeans). These are small parts of the equation. We can see what happened to Iceland and Ireland, previously gloryfied by the international evaluation companies and praised by the financial newspapers as "heavens for investments". They were previously referred as paradeigms for prosperity and wealth as "celtic tigers", "Nordic tigers", while blaiming them as dumb-headed crooks and drunkards on the next day. The world 's bankers and capitalists can easily throw whole countries in the junk, when less profit is expected than forecasted.
Greece is the first field of experimentation, an international capital's plans of a "pilot episode" in Europe for paving a way for more countries to follow, the ones with the weakest economies first.
I recommend the reading of Naomi Klein 's book "The Shock Doctrine" and Avi Lewis' subsequent documentary (6 parts), a couple of Canadian Jews and activists, as a robust and revealing reference for the IMF 's and World Bank 's interventions in the developing countries.

Concluding, the greek government has no constitutional right of applying such a "colonisation" lawbill that undermines the country 's future for at least one or two generations. This government has to step down, and both its members ("PASOK" - so called "socialists"), together with the leading opposition party ("Nea Dimokratia" - rightwings / conservatives) to be brought to justice for their irresponsible financial management of the last decades. They are illegal, they offend the Constitution, they are traitors, they are puppets of their powerful friends and bosses. NO, THIS COUNTRY IS NOT FOR SALE. NO COUNTRY OF THE WORLD IS FOR SALE. It is forbidden by the 1969 Vienna Convention.


Regarding the unprecended riots and unbelievable police brutality that took place in the greater Athens historical centre on Wednesday, June 29th:

Given the size of the gathered crowd, the numerous squads of the riot police (MAT) were beating indescretely and posing a continuous threat for the the security of peacefully protesting common people in the Square. The stewards (demonstration marshals) proved too few and unexperienced to cope with hordes of fascists, neo-nazis, police agents provocateurs, and individual vandals storming the Square 's plateau, the demonstrators' camp and the shops neighbouring the Square. After that, the police started raiding the whole historical centre by brutally attacking almost everybody looking like "youngster", "demostrator" or even tourist, by parading on motorbikes and throwing shock grenades and teargas over the Monastiraki area and even attacking and beating people inside the Acropolis metro station, just next to the Acropolis Museum, almost one kilometer away of the Syntagma Square. This is simply unbelieavable. Not even under the '67-'74 military junta was there a beatup like this.
Of course the government has given certain orders to the police leaders and don 't give a damn whether the center of the city was like a warzone. No officials resignations, nothing. Everything is OK.
In the weekend, the Socialist International, presided by Yorgos Papandreou with current members guys like Bill Clinton and former members dictators like Tunisia 's Ben Ali, Egypt 's Hoshni Mubarak and Libya 's Moammar Ghedaffi, is conferencing in Asteras, one of the most luxurius hotels of the country, despite the crisis.

Riot police indescretely attacking the camp in Syntagma square:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S20_JuaX8gg

"DIAS" (ΔΙΑΣ - motorcycle-born riot police) raiding the highly touristic and crowded area of Monastiraki on Mitropoleos str. walkway and neighbouring metro interchange with shock grenades and teargas, very far away from the clashes theatre:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_j0cIIboGA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SiA2vLn_Tw

Riot police (MAT) sheltering ultra-right agents provocateurs ("inciting agents") next to the garage ramp of the Greek Parliament building. These people were identifed as workers of the Public Bus Transportation company (ETHEL/ ΕΘΕΛ) by the president of the ETHEL workers' union:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsyPETK7qag

MAT officers throwing stones to the crowd:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7NLPZD1X5c



People injured by MAT on the Syntagma Square metro station staircases:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLRqgpcvnag

MAT throwing teargas in the Syntagma Square metro station serving as a rough paramedic point for the more than 500 people injured, after the main one in the demonstrators' camp was destroyed by the police forces:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5vYgF7oa60
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0EIYGlpwDM
http://vimeo.com/25777463

"Not even in war this happens... Greece has signed the Geneva convention. That applies both over international warfares and domestic disputes about the injured... And MAT violated that". Footage by Yorgos Avgeropoulos, a documentary film director (The Argentina experiment), of doctors' testimonies about the police behaviour:
http://vimeo.com/25781283


For the German-speaking (and not only!) friends, please have a look at Betabug 's fellow blog:
http://www.betabug.ch/blogs/ch-athens

Also, Avi Lewis and Naomi Klein 's "The Take".
The Loan Facilitation Contract in Greek, German and English.