#mariannam — Public Fediverse posts

Comrades Dimitra Zarafeta and Marianna Manoura Sentenced in Ampelokipi Case Hearing

Updates from the 12th – final – hearing of the Ampelokipi case 24/4/26

Dimitris P., Nikos Romanos and A.K. – Innocent due to doubt

Comrades Dimitra Zarafeta and Marianna Manoura – Guilty

Dimitra was convicted for her stance in court, for not renouncing her ideology, and for developing her thoughts without weighing up whether this would work against her. The court must be based on objective criteria, not ideology, and based on this, conversion should be evaluated.

For Marianna, the court did not accept the mitigating circumstances.

For Dimitra, the majority only accepted the paragraph concerning good conduct after the act was committed, that is, inside prison.

Marianna M. and Dimitra Z. were convicted of the following acts: criminal organization; aggravated manufacture of explosive devices; possession of explosive materials, explosive devices, pistols and ammunition; supply and possession of explosive materials; explosion using explosive materials; damage to another’s property.

Total penalties…

19 years for comrade Marianna

8 years for comrade Dimitra

THE ONLY TERRORIST IS THE STATE

FIRE TO THE PRISONS

Athens: (Greece) Updates from the 12th – final – hearing of the Ampelokipi case [decision day]

Comrades Dimitra Zarafeta and Marianna Manoura Sentenced in Ampelokipi Case Hearing

Updates from the 12th – final – hearing of the Ampelokipi case 24/4/26

Dimitris P., Nikos Romanos and A.K. – Innocent due to doubt

Comrades Dimitra Zarafeta and Marianna Manoura – Guilty

Dimitra was convicted for her stance in court, for not renouncing her ideology, and for developing her thoughts without weighing up whether this would work against her. The court must be based on objective criteria, not ideology, and based on this, conversion should be evaluated.

For Marianna, the court did not accept the mitigating circumstances.

For Dimitra, the majority only accepted the paragraph concerning good conduct after the act was committed, that is, inside prison.

Marianna M. and Dimitra Z. were convicted of the following acts: criminal organization; aggravated manufacture of explosive devices; possession of explosive materials, explosive devices, pistols and ammunition; supply and possession of explosive materials; explosion using explosive materials; damage to another’s property.

Total penalties…

19 years for comrade Marianna

8 years for comrade Dimitra

THE ONLY TERRORIST IS THE STATE

FIRE TO THE PRISONS

Athens: (Greece) Updates from the 12th – final – hearing of the Ampelokipi case [decision day]

Statements by Comrades Marianna Manoura and Dimitra Zarafeta on Day 2 of the Trial (Athens, Greece)

Marianna Manoura

I would like to state to the residents of the apartment building that the explosion was not due to an organized plan. It resulted in the death of my comrade, Kyriakos Xymitiris, and my own serious injury. We never wanted general people to suffer, nor to cause damage to people whilst social conditions are already very serious. When our political space wants to attack it evaluates, and the logic of collateral damage is in no way consistent with its values. We use our means against the system alone.

I thank the two people who helped me immediately after the explosion.

The explosion has been exploited by the state from the very beginning.

I will never claim that it was a conspiracy. I take political responsibility for the actions, but I will not waste a single minute of my freedom for things I did not do.

My comprade, Kyriakos Xymitiris, lost his life for a better world.

His death has been instrumentalized and vilified through the imputation of the explosion, an accusation by the counter-terrorism that Kyriakos was aware of what would follow.

Kyriakos, as a political subject, loved life; not only his own, but also that of others. As a human being, it is impossible that he would want to burden general people with damage to their homes.

I am not accountable to any court, I am only accountable to my comrades.

It is in your hands how this trial will be conducted, whether you will follow the orders of counterterrorism, or whether you will judge based on the actual facts.

I can take political responsibility for what is my responsibility.

I dedicate every minute of this trial to the memory of Kyriakos.

Kyriakos was a wonderful man and a sensitive revolutionary.

10/31 is a breaking point for me, both for the moral burden of the damage to the apartment building and for the loss. I will preserve it to preserve the memory of Kyriakos, his choices, and my place within them.

Dimitra Zarafeta

I deny all the charges.

I wish to pay tribute to the memory of my comrade, Kyriakos Xymitiris.

Political action, friendships and political relationships are being criminalized.

The deprivation of my liberty is the responsibility of the court, which allows such cases to be filed.

I apologize to the family who own the apartment, as, unknowingly, I put them in an unpleasant position due both to the damage and to the involvement with the repressive mechanism.

Statements from the two comrades Marianna Manoura and Dimitra Zarafeta in the 2 day of the trial. (Athens,Greece)

Statements by Comrades Marianna Manoura and Dimitra Zarafeta on Day 2 of the Trial (Athens, Greece)

Marianna Manoura

I would like to state to the residents of the apartment building that the explosion was not due to an organized plan. It resulted in the death of my comrade, Kyriakos Xymitiris, and my own serious injury. We never wanted general people to suffer, nor to cause damage to people whilst social conditions are already very serious. When our political space wants to attack it evaluates, and the logic of collateral damage is in no way consistent with its values. We use our means against the system alone.

I thank the two people who helped me immediately after the explosion.

The explosion has been exploited by the state from the very beginning.

I will never claim that it was a conspiracy. I take political responsibility for the actions, but I will not waste a single minute of my freedom for things I did not do.

My comprade, Kyriakos Xymitiris, lost his life for a better world.

His death has been instrumentalized and vilified through the imputation of the explosion, an accusation by the counter-terrorism that Kyriakos was aware of what would follow.

Kyriakos, as a political subject, loved life; not only his own, but also that of others. As a human being, it is impossible that he would want to burden general people with damage to their homes.

I am not accountable to any court, I am only accountable to my comrades.

It is in your hands how this trial will be conducted, whether you will follow the orders of counterterrorism, or whether you will judge based on the actual facts.

I can take political responsibility for what is my responsibility.

I dedicate every minute of this trial to the memory of Kyriakos.

Kyriakos was a wonderful man and a sensitive revolutionary.

10/31 is a breaking point for me, both for the moral burden of the damage to the apartment building and for the loss. I will preserve it to preserve the memory of Kyriakos, his choices, and my place within them.

Dimitra Zarafeta

I deny all the charges.

I wish to pay tribute to the memory of my comrade, Kyriakos Xymitiris.

Political action, friendships and political relationships are being criminalized.

The deprivation of my liberty is the responsibility of the court, which allows such cases to be filed.

I apologize to the family who own the apartment, as, unknowingly, I put them in an unpleasant position due both to the damage and to the involvement with the repressive mechanism.

Statements from the two comrades Marianna Manoura and Dimitra Zarafeta in the 2 day of the trial. (Athens,Greece)

I Defend, I Don’t Apologize – Marianna Manoura

In the midst of revelations of all kinds of government scandals and the participation of the Greek state in the war unleashed by the US and Israel against Iran, the repressive mechanism decided to deal with the “internal enemy”. Three weeks before the first hearing, we were notified of the start of our trial. On April 1 and one month before the end of the 18-month period, the process begins. A process based on an obviously inflated indictment where it is obvious that four of the five defendants have nothing to do with or knew about what was going to happen on 31/10. The court’s focus, however, is not exclusively to highlight the otherwise well-used tactics of the anti-terrorist unit, but to defend the memory of the revolutionary Kyriakos Xymitiris and the armed means of resistance he decided to adopt against this cannibalistic system.

From the very beginning, the prosecuting authorities with the counter-terrorism at the helm saw this specific case as an ideal event to open yet another fan of persecutions and imprisonments of people. The apparent inability of the anti-terrorism police to establish even a pretextually credible indictment held us all hostage, with requests to terminate the temporary detention being rejected in all the interim judicial councils (six months and twelve months) with flimsy justifications. The case was thus kept open, in the absence of any new evidence to justify it, with the councils’ dismissive reasoning self-refuting at points, trying to find a new narrative in order to exhaust the limit of pre-trial detention for all the defendants, thus attempting to satisfy two goals: on the one hand, the consolidation of state vindictiveness and on the other hand, the maintenance of the narrative of a terrorist organization. An organization without a name, without a history, without action, without even a substance, the invention of which serves on the one hand spectacular-communicational reasons, but also a serious upgrade of the indictment that carries the risk of lethal penalties.

The result of this pretentious delay in closing the case for 17 months, was the delay in issuing and final deliberations, with the result that the trial is now approaching the typical time limit for the end of detention for all the detainees in the case. A fact that in itself causes a rush in its definition and conduct, with the service of its summons to take place on 09/03, just 3 weeks before its start on April 1, suffocatingly pressing our preparation time. I am therefore called, on April 1st, to stand trial accused of forming and joining a terrorist organization, aggravated manufacture of explosive devices and possession of explosive materials and explosive devices, pistols and ammunition, explosion with possible intent, aggravated damage and illegal possession of weapons, in a trial that has shown signs of haste and carelessness from the beginning. The situation that is taking shape may not surprise me. I am very well aware of the role of civil justice within this specific system of exploitation, which while pretending to play its role within a “rule of law”, is in reality primarily interested in implementing the dictates of anti-terrorist and political leadership. Nevertheless, I categorically declare that I am not prepared to allow any acceleration of the trial to work against me and my co-defendants and my comrade Kyriakos himself.

And if the counter-terrorism service took, once again, 17 months to return to where it started from, without any new evidence but insisting on prosecuting me – bagging me with four other people who have absolutely no connection, involvement or knowledge in the case, the trial in question includes a new method. The complete absence of all the counter-terrorism cops from the prosecution’s witnesses. That is, the prosecution, under the orders under which the investigations took place, the arrest warrants were issued and the charges were filed, considers that there is no reason to appear in the proceedings. That is, the prosecution does not appear in a case that it itself is prosecuting. I am not in a position to know the exact reasons why this happened. It is a fact that with the new amendments of 2024 (Floridis Law) it is now possible not to call the police officers who draw up an indictment and lead the pre-trial stage in the trial in an obvious attempt to protect themselves from foreseen contradictions that will eventually arise. However, especially in this case, with such a perforated indictment and a case file full of contradictions, gaps and obvious shortcomings, the absence of anti-terrorist police officers from the prosecution’s witness list aims to protect them in the courtroom with the expected deconstruction of their fabrications.

Whether it comes or not, the responsibilities will be attributed to them. Responsibility for the shameful way in which they treated the family of my comrade Kyriakos Ximitiris in the first hours of the explosion, which far exceeds the moral limits that these unscrupulous guys who swear by democracy and legality supposedly invoke and that they supposedly protect. Responsibility also for the order to take a DNA sample while I was still unconscious in Evangelismos. Responsibility for the fact that once again, like so many others in its years of action, the counter-terrorism is the spearhead of repression with surveillance, persecution, imprisonment of countless fighters.

On the contrary, I will be there. I will be there to assume the responsibilities that fall to me, to defend the political choice for the position I held on 31/10. I will be there to stand up to a mechanism that proves its bias every day and that, for decades now, has been unfolding its full vindictiveness in the face of fighters. Despite all the possible consequences, however, I will proudly defend my partner’s choices, the necessity of fighting by all means, the gravity of this choice and the imprint it leaves. And I will be there because the political space to which I have belonged for the last 15 years of my life is dominated by other values ​​and agendas than those promoted by the system. It does not shift the responsibilities of others as the government does every day, it does not defend partisanship and individual interest as the system promotes, and it does not choose the easy path of selfishness as its representatives choose.

I will not attend the trial to bow my head, nor to renounce my ideas and responsibilities. But I will not give even one more day of freedom to their hands for actions that I not only did not do but also for which there is no evidence to support them. Moreover, the issue of the trial is mainly the preservation of the revolutionary memory of the comrade. Of the deposition of all these elements that make him such an indispensable and unique comrade and person. For me, this is the stake of this particular trial; the prevalence of the image of comrade Kyriakos as we knew him, learned about him, experienced him. As a deeply revolutionary man who, beyond his commitment and presence in the field, decided to sharpen his way of acting despite the adverse conditions that prevail. This is for me the legacy that I hope such a trial will leave. Of devotion and faith in the revolutionary vision even during the greatest challenge. The sign of solidarity and the defense of projects that want us continuously and practically against those who oppress our lives and alongside those who struggle by all means. The dignity and pride that befits our political space from whose bosoms fighters like Kyriakos emerge. People who do not retreat, do not compromise, whose sparkling gaze is enough to illuminate even the most difficult path.

But Kyriakos will be there too. That’s where his heart will beat. Next to me and all the accused. Next to his comrades. He will be there because he knows that the fight for memory is a collective affair and is not simply necessary but essential. Essential for a movement to exist and have a future. Because the stories of those who fell are the ones that inspired others to rise. And as much as the weight of loss bends our knees, it is enough to take a look at that sparkling gaze of his for the fatigue to be shared and the fear to diminish. And if at some point we become discouraged, a look at his genuine smile is enough to remember that nothing is over.

With Kyriakos as our companion, it is in our hands, inside and outside the walls, to reverse the terms of the trial both before and during it. To put a stop to the injustice that has become law, to the bias that has become habit. To perceive justice as a battlefield and the trial as a political conflict. Since the field is already mined, it is an unequal battle, in which there is no middle ground. Either you give up or you fight until the end. And what I can say with certainty is that I and certainly Kyriakos would choose the latter. We are right, we will win.

KYRIAKOS XYMITIRIS ALWAYS PRESENT
HONOR FOREVER TO ANARCHIST COMRADE SARAH ARDIZONE AND ANARCHIST COMRADE ALESSANDRO MERCOLIANO
STATE AND CAPITAL THE ONLY TERRORISTS

Marianna Manoura
Women’s prisons of Korydallos

Source: https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1640410/

I Defend, I Don’t Apologize – Marianna Manoura

In the midst of revelations of all kinds of government scandals and the participation of the Greek state in the war unleashed by the US and Israel against Iran, the repressive mechanism decided to deal with the “internal enemy”. Three weeks before the first hearing, we were notified of the start of our trial. On April 1 and one month before the end of the 18-month period, the process begins. A process based on an obviously inflated indictment where it is obvious that four of the five defendants have nothing to do with or knew about what was going to happen on 31/10. The court’s focus, however, is not exclusively to highlight the otherwise well-used tactics of the anti-terrorist unit, but to defend the memory of the revolutionary Kyriakos Xymitiris and the armed means of resistance he decided to adopt against this cannibalistic system.

From the very beginning, the prosecuting authorities with the counter-terrorism at the helm saw this specific case as an ideal event to open yet another fan of persecutions and imprisonments of people. The apparent inability of the anti-terrorism police to establish even a pretextually credible indictment held us all hostage, with requests to terminate the temporary detention being rejected in all the interim judicial councils (six months and twelve months) with flimsy justifications. The case was thus kept open, in the absence of any new evidence to justify it, with the councils’ dismissive reasoning self-refuting at points, trying to find a new narrative in order to exhaust the limit of pre-trial detention for all the defendants, thus attempting to satisfy two goals: on the one hand, the consolidation of state vindictiveness and on the other hand, the maintenance of the narrative of a terrorist organization. An organization without a name, without a history, without action, without even a substance, the invention of which serves on the one hand spectacular-communicational reasons, but also a serious upgrade of the indictment that carries the risk of lethal penalties.

The result of this pretentious delay in closing the case for 17 months, was the delay in issuing and final deliberations, with the result that the trial is now approaching the typical time limit for the end of detention for all the detainees in the case. A fact that in itself causes a rush in its definition and conduct, with the service of its summons to take place on 09/03, just 3 weeks before its start on April 1, suffocatingly pressing our preparation time. I am therefore called, on April 1st, to stand trial accused of forming and joining a terrorist organization, aggravated manufacture of explosive devices and possession of explosive materials and explosive devices, pistols and ammunition, explosion with possible intent, aggravated damage and illegal possession of weapons, in a trial that has shown signs of haste and carelessness from the beginning. The situation that is taking shape may not surprise me. I am very well aware of the role of civil justice within this specific system of exploitation, which while pretending to play its role within a “rule of law”, is in reality primarily interested in implementing the dictates of anti-terrorist and political leadership. Nevertheless, I categorically declare that I am not prepared to allow any acceleration of the trial to work against me and my co-defendants and my comrade Kyriakos himself.

And if the counter-terrorism service took, once again, 17 months to return to where it started from, without any new evidence but insisting on prosecuting me – bagging me with four other people who have absolutely no connection, involvement or knowledge in the case, the trial in question includes a new method. The complete absence of all the counter-terrorism cops from the prosecution’s witnesses. That is, the prosecution, under the orders under which the investigations took place, the arrest warrants were issued and the charges were filed, considers that there is no reason to appear in the proceedings. That is, the prosecution does not appear in a case that it itself is prosecuting. I am not in a position to know the exact reasons why this happened. It is a fact that with the new amendments of 2024 (Floridis Law) it is now possible not to call the police officers who draw up an indictment and lead the pre-trial stage in the trial in an obvious attempt to protect themselves from foreseen contradictions that will eventually arise. However, especially in this case, with such a perforated indictment and a case file full of contradictions, gaps and obvious shortcomings, the absence of anti-terrorist police officers from the prosecution’s witness list aims to protect them in the courtroom with the expected deconstruction of their fabrications.

Whether it comes or not, the responsibilities will be attributed to them. Responsibility for the shameful way in which they treated the family of my comrade Kyriakos Ximitiris in the first hours of the explosion, which far exceeds the moral limits that these unscrupulous guys who swear by democracy and legality supposedly invoke and that they supposedly protect. Responsibility also for the order to take a DNA sample while I was still unconscious in Evangelismos. Responsibility for the fact that once again, like so many others in its years of action, the counter-terrorism is the spearhead of repression with surveillance, persecution, imprisonment of countless fighters.

On the contrary, I will be there. I will be there to assume the responsibilities that fall to me, to defend the political choice for the position I held on 31/10. I will be there to stand up to a mechanism that proves its bias every day and that, for decades now, has been unfolding its full vindictiveness in the face of fighters. Despite all the possible consequences, however, I will proudly defend my partner’s choices, the necessity of fighting by all means, the gravity of this choice and the imprint it leaves. And I will be there because the political space to which I have belonged for the last 15 years of my life is dominated by other values ​​and agendas than those promoted by the system. It does not shift the responsibilities of others as the government does every day, it does not defend partisanship and individual interest as the system promotes, and it does not choose the easy path of selfishness as its representatives choose.

I will not attend the trial to bow my head, nor to renounce my ideas and responsibilities. But I will not give even one more day of freedom to their hands for actions that I not only did not do but also for which there is no evidence to support them. Moreover, the issue of the trial is mainly the preservation of the revolutionary memory of the comrade. Of the deposition of all these elements that make him such an indispensable and unique comrade and person. For me, this is the stake of this particular trial; the prevalence of the image of comrade Kyriakos as we knew him, learned about him, experienced him. As a deeply revolutionary man who, beyond his commitment and presence in the field, decided to sharpen his way of acting despite the adverse conditions that prevail. This is for me the legacy that I hope such a trial will leave. Of devotion and faith in the revolutionary vision even during the greatest challenge. The sign of solidarity and the defense of projects that want us continuously and practically against those who oppress our lives and alongside those who struggle by all means. The dignity and pride that befits our political space from whose bosoms fighters like Kyriakos emerge. People who do not retreat, do not compromise, whose sparkling gaze is enough to illuminate even the most difficult path.

But Kyriakos will be there too. That’s where his heart will beat. Next to me and all the accused. Next to his comrades. He will be there because he knows that the fight for memory is a collective affair and is not simply necessary but essential. Essential for a movement to exist and have a future. Because the stories of those who fell are the ones that inspired others to rise. And as much as the weight of loss bends our knees, it is enough to take a look at that sparkling gaze of his for the fatigue to be shared and the fear to diminish. And if at some point we become discouraged, a look at his genuine smile is enough to remember that nothing is over.

With Kyriakos as our companion, it is in our hands, inside and outside the walls, to reverse the terms of the trial both before and during it. To put a stop to the injustice that has become law, to the bias that has become habit. To perceive justice as a battlefield and the trial as a political conflict. Since the field is already mined, it is an unequal battle, in which there is no middle ground. Either you give up or you fight until the end. And what I can say with certainty is that I and certainly Kyriakos would choose the latter. We are right, we will win.

KYRIAKOS XYMITIRIS ALWAYS PRESENT
HONOR FOREVER TO ANARCHIST COMRADE SARAH ARDIZONE AND ANARCHIST COMRADE ALESSANDRO MERCOLIANO
STATE AND CAPITAL THE ONLY TERRORISTS

Marianna Manoura
Women’s prisons of Korydallos

Source: https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1640410/

International Week of Solidarity Action with Imprisoned Comrades of Ampelokipi Case and in Memory of Kyriakos Xymitiris

We call for an International Week of Solidarity Action (24-31 March) with the imprisoned comrades for Ampelokipi case and in memory of the anarchist armed fighter Kyriakos Xymitiris.

These days before the beginning of the trial on the 1st of April at Athens Court of Appeal, we call for comrades around the world to participate, in order to collectively fight for our comrades’ Marianna Manoura, Dimitra Zarafeta, Dimitris, Nikos Romanos and for A.K’s release, as well as defend the memory of our comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris.

Our support and solidarity is non-negotiable and in the battle they are facing -at court this time- we will stand by their side.

Solidarity Manifestation Friday 27/3, 7pm at Syntagma Square (Athens, Greece)

Solidarity manifestation (beginning of the trial) Wednesday 1/4, 8.30am, Athens Court of Appeal

FREE COMRADES MARIANNA MANOURA, DIMITRA ZARAFETA, DIMITRIS, NIKOS ROMANOS AND A.K.

KYRIAKOS XIMITIRIS ALWAYS PRESENT

STATES ARE THE ONLY TERRORISTS

Solidarity Assembly for the imprisoned,

fugitives and persecuted fighters

[email protected]

We call for an Internationl Week of Solidarity Action (24-31 March) with the imprisoned comrades for Ampelokipi case and in memory of the anarchist armed fighter Kyriakos Xymitiris.

International Week of Solidarity Action with Imprisoned Comrades of Ampelokipi Case and in Memory of Kyriakos Xymitiris

We call for an International Week of Solidarity Action (24-31 March) with the imprisoned comrades for Ampelokipi case and in memory of the anarchist armed fighter Kyriakos Xymitiris.

These days before the beginning of the trial on the 1st of April at Athens Court of Appeal, we call for comrades around the world to participate, in order to collectively fight for our comrades’ Marianna Manoura, Dimitra Zarafeta, Dimitris, Nikos Romanos and for A.K’s release, as well as defend the memory of our comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris.

Our support and solidarity is non-negotiable and in the battle they are facing -at court this time- we will stand by their side.

Solidarity Manifestation Friday 27/3, 7pm at Syntagma Square (Athens, Greece)

Solidarity manifestation (beginning of the trial) Wednesday 1/4, 8.30am, Athens Court of Appeal

FREE COMRADES MARIANNA MANOURA, DIMITRA ZARAFETA, DIMITRIS, NIKOS ROMANOS AND A.K.

KYRIAKOS XIMITIRIS ALWAYS PRESENT

STATES ARE THE ONLY TERRORISTS

Solidarity Assembly for the imprisoned,

fugitives and persecuted fighters

[email protected]

We call for an Internationl Week of Solidarity Action (24-31 March) with the imprisoned comrades for Ampelokipi case and in memory of the anarchist armed fighter Kyriakos Xymitiris.

Trial Begins for the Ampelokipi Case

On Wednesday, April 1 (9am), at the 2nd three-member felony panel in Loukareos (4th floor, room D100C), the trial begins for our detained comrades who are being prosecuted for the case of the explosion in an apartment in Ampelokipi. We call for a solidarity rally that day, as well as for the next trials to be scheduled.

The text of the assembly on the case follows.

On 31/10/24, after an explosion in an apartment in Ampelokipi, the anarchist comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris fell in the battle for social and class liberation, while the anarchist comrade Marianna M. ended up seriously injured in the ICU of Evangelismos. She was transferred to the women’s prison of Korydallos where to this day she is deprived of the necessary medical care.

The well-known “witch hunt” and the attempt to shape impressions by the media follow. The narrative is set up as follows: the processing of (a small amount of) explosive material and mechanisms with only the anarchist comrades Kyriakos and Marianna present and knowledgeable is called an organization, the apartment to which there was access only for a few days is called a yafka [safe house used by clandestine urban guerrilla groups], anyone involved with it is targeted and interrogated. Amidst media propaganda, the state and its persecutory mechanisms orchestrate and unleash their repressive plan regarding an anonymous “terrorist” organization with the pool of suspects including friends, relatives, and even strangers, criminalizing political, comradely, and friendly relationships. The anarchist comrade Dimitra Z. and comrade Dimitris are arrested and remanded in custody with the only connection being their relationship with the apartment in which the explosion occurred. A few weeks later, the arrests and pre-trial detentions follow with a unique “element” of a fingerprint section on a mobile object of two more individuals, the anarchist comrade Nikos Romanos and A.K. This flimsy element of the anti-terrorist service, whose pass-through evidence is used without any further questioning by the judicial system, has been used extensively in methods of trapping activists.

The judicial mechanism, in the service of the same state strategy, extended, a few days ago, the pre-trial detention of all those who claimed their freedom, rejecting the requests for release. The pre-trial detainees are once again being tried to appear as unconscious, “blind” bombers, as a “public danger”.

However, the truth is far from their police reports and their miserable publications. In contrast to the barbarity of the capitalist world, the anarchist concept stands against and consciously acts against the logic of collateral damage, which now parades as evidence of guilt against means and choices of struggle. Which oppressed, which poor, which proletarian, which immigrant has reason to believe that they are in danger from the world of Struggle and its choices? From people dedicated to the fight against inequality and exploitation, people who take their place on the lines of revolutionary struggle, who dedicate and are ultimately capable of giving their own lives to the defense of high ideals, to the overthrow of the world of power. People who resist in every way the storm of privatization, individualization, indifference to the commons and politics.

The proletariat, the social majority, have no common interest with the oil and drug smugglers, the intertwined mafiosi, the powerful millionaire oligarchs of banking, construction, shipping and industrial capital who own all of the major systemic media. With those who openly support the policies of governments, who profit from the unbearable accuracy in basic necessities and anti-worker legislation, who cover up state murders at the borders, in police stations, on public transport, on the streets, who wash and cover up scandals and rapists. Who are connected to the international and domestic arms industry, who promote and support the participation of the Greek state on all war fronts and in the genocide of the Palestinians. The poor, the oppressed, the marginalized, the proletariat – natives or refugees and immigrants – know that the revolutionary struggle, the radical struggle, is waged within the class war, for their interests.

For this reason, we do not forget and will not stop saying: The state and capital were, are and will be terrorists. They terrorize through the daily oppression of our lives. They are the ones who exploit and plunder nature and our lives in order to maximize their profits, who condemn us to poverty and destitution, who throw us out onto the street by selling out the obvious need for housing to funds, who turn our neighborhoods into inaccessible tourist zones, who hide the ever-increasing worker murders behind the word accident, who kill immigrants and refugees at the borders, in labor camps and police stations, who cover up and reproduce patriarchy and sexist violence by shamelessly handing out panic buttons. Those who wage wars on the altar of their economic and political interests, those who redistribute the world by staining their hands with blood, those who attack the peoples of the Middle East and level the resisting Gaza, those who commit the genocide of the Palestinian people. Those who confirm the violence of a system of inequalities, the violence of the powerful.

Revolutionary anti-violence is a necessary tool of struggle as a collective defense of social parties that struggle against state repressive violence, as it can act as a lever of pressure to sabotage the plans of the sovereign, to prevent national wars but also to spread the revolutionary project. Armed struggle as part of revolutionary anti-violence, attempts and succeeds in returning to the state a portion of the violence that it daily inflicts on us. Armed struggle is an integral part of the radical movement, of the multifaceted social and class struggle, deeply rooted in our militant tradition, and we defend it as non-negotiable.

Part of this continuous insurrectionary movement of resistance against the imposition of power was the armed anarchist fighter Kyriakos Xymitiris. Comrade Kyriakos was for years continuously present in projects of solidarity with prisoners, in the anti-war Internationalist movement, in actions for the defense of the Exarchia neighborhood, in the struggles within the universities, in the defense of the liberated spaces of occupations and in every social and class struggle. He chose to fight to the end, fighting with all means the world of power, the state, capital, racism, patriarchy. He chose to fight on the side of the oppressed and the rebels for a better world, for a world of solidarity, equality, freedom. Somehow his last breath found him, where he consciously and always consistently chose to be, in the struggle.

We defend all those who gave their lives, who were imprisoned, who fought, who were confronted with state methods throughout so many years of social and class war.

WHO FORGETS THE PRISONERS OF WAR
FORGETS THE WAR ITSELF

KYRIAKOS XYMITIRIS PRESENT

Solidarity Assembly for the imprisoned, fugitive and persecuted activists
[email protected]

Source: https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1640139/

Trial Begins for the Ampelokipi Case

On Wednesday, April 1 (9am), at the 2nd three-member felony panel in Loukareos (4th floor, room D100C), the trial begins for our detained comrades who are being prosecuted for the case of the explosion in an apartment in Ampelokipi. We call for a solidarity rally that day, as well as for the next trials to be scheduled.

The text of the assembly on the case follows.

On 31/10/24, after an explosion in an apartment in Ampelokipi, the anarchist comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris fell in the battle for social and class liberation, while the anarchist comrade Marianna M. ended up seriously injured in the ICU of Evangelismos. She was transferred to the women’s prison of Korydallos where to this day she is deprived of the necessary medical care.

The well-known “witch hunt” and the attempt to shape impressions by the media follow. The narrative is set up as follows: the processing of (a small amount of) explosive material and mechanisms with only the anarchist comrades Kyriakos and Marianna present and knowledgeable is called an organization, the apartment to which there was access only for a few days is called a yafka [safe house used by clandestine urban guerrilla groups], anyone involved with it is targeted and interrogated. Amidst media propaganda, the state and its persecutory mechanisms orchestrate and unleash their repressive plan regarding an anonymous “terrorist” organization with the pool of suspects including friends, relatives, and even strangers, criminalizing political, comradely, and friendly relationships. The anarchist comrade Dimitra Z. and comrade Dimitris are arrested and remanded in custody with the only connection being their relationship with the apartment in which the explosion occurred. A few weeks later, the arrests and pre-trial detentions follow with a unique “element” of a fingerprint section on a mobile object of two more individuals, the anarchist comrade Nikos Romanos and A.K. This flimsy element of the anti-terrorist service, whose pass-through evidence is used without any further questioning by the judicial system, has been used extensively in methods of trapping activists.

The judicial mechanism, in the service of the same state strategy, extended, a few days ago, the pre-trial detention of all those who claimed their freedom, rejecting the requests for release. The pre-trial detainees are once again being tried to appear as unconscious, “blind” bombers, as a “public danger”.

However, the truth is far from their police reports and their miserable publications. In contrast to the barbarity of the capitalist world, the anarchist concept stands against and consciously acts against the logic of collateral damage, which now parades as evidence of guilt against means and choices of struggle. Which oppressed, which poor, which proletarian, which immigrant has reason to believe that they are in danger from the world of Struggle and its choices? From people dedicated to the fight against inequality and exploitation, people who take their place on the lines of revolutionary struggle, who dedicate and are ultimately capable of giving their own lives to the defense of high ideals, to the overthrow of the world of power. People who resist in every way the storm of privatization, individualization, indifference to the commons and politics.

The proletariat, the social majority, have no common interest with the oil and drug smugglers, the intertwined mafiosi, the powerful millionaire oligarchs of banking, construction, shipping and industrial capital who own all of the major systemic media. With those who openly support the policies of governments, who profit from the unbearable accuracy in basic necessities and anti-worker legislation, who cover up state murders at the borders, in police stations, on public transport, on the streets, who wash and cover up scandals and rapists. Who are connected to the international and domestic arms industry, who promote and support the participation of the Greek state on all war fronts and in the genocide of the Palestinians. The poor, the oppressed, the marginalized, the proletariat – natives or refugees and immigrants – know that the revolutionary struggle, the radical struggle, is waged within the class war, for their interests.

For this reason, we do not forget and will not stop saying: The state and capital were, are and will be terrorists. They terrorize through the daily oppression of our lives. They are the ones who exploit and plunder nature and our lives in order to maximize their profits, who condemn us to poverty and destitution, who throw us out onto the street by selling out the obvious need for housing to funds, who turn our neighborhoods into inaccessible tourist zones, who hide the ever-increasing worker murders behind the word accident, who kill immigrants and refugees at the borders, in labor camps and police stations, who cover up and reproduce patriarchy and sexist violence by shamelessly handing out panic buttons. Those who wage wars on the altar of their economic and political interests, those who redistribute the world by staining their hands with blood, those who attack the peoples of the Middle East and level the resisting Gaza, those who commit the genocide of the Palestinian people. Those who confirm the violence of a system of inequalities, the violence of the powerful.

Revolutionary anti-violence is a necessary tool of struggle as a collective defense of social parties that struggle against state repressive violence, as it can act as a lever of pressure to sabotage the plans of the sovereign, to prevent national wars but also to spread the revolutionary project. Armed struggle as part of revolutionary anti-violence, attempts and succeeds in returning to the state a portion of the violence that it daily inflicts on us. Armed struggle is an integral part of the radical movement, of the multifaceted social and class struggle, deeply rooted in our militant tradition, and we defend it as non-negotiable.

Part of this continuous insurrectionary movement of resistance against the imposition of power was the armed anarchist fighter Kyriakos Xymitiris. Comrade Kyriakos was for years continuously present in projects of solidarity with prisoners, in the anti-war Internationalist movement, in actions for the defense of the Exarchia neighborhood, in the struggles within the universities, in the defense of the liberated spaces of occupations and in every social and class struggle. He chose to fight to the end, fighting with all means the world of power, the state, capital, racism, patriarchy. He chose to fight on the side of the oppressed and the rebels for a better world, for a world of solidarity, equality, freedom. Somehow his last breath found him, where he consciously and always consistently chose to be, in the struggle.

We defend all those who gave their lives, who were imprisoned, who fought, who were confronted with state methods throughout so many years of social and class war.

WHO FORGETS THE PRISONERS OF WAR
FORGETS THE WAR ITSELF

KYRIAKOS XYMITIRIS PRESENT

Solidarity Assembly for the imprisoned, fugitive and persecuted activists
[email protected]

Source: https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1640139/

On the Trail of the Struggle: Lambros Fountas Present

by Marianna Manoura & Dimitra Zarafeta

On March 10, 16 years ago, Lambros Fountas, a member of the Revolutionary Struggle organization, was shot dead by the police. The murder of the anarchist comrade took place during the preparatory action of the organization in Dafni during an armed clash with the police forces.

The anarchist movement from the very first days defended and continues to defend the memory and content of the action of the armed fighter Lambros Foudas through marches, events, actions. The very organization of which he was a member carried out a blow to the Bank of Greece in 2014, dedicating it to his fallen comrade, taking responsibility under the signature “Commando Lambros Foundas”, thus paying tribute to the revolutionary.

Lambros Fountas, as a member of the armed revolutionary organization Revolutionary Struggle, chose to act through the armed proletarian counterattack at a time when the social base was affected by austerity measures. Measures imposed by the local and international elite in order to avoid the bankruptcy of the European banking system. And while politicians and channel managers present the memorandums and contracts as “means of salvation”, we experienced them as salary and pension cuts, as an impoverished today and as an uncertain tomorrow.

The Revolutionary Struggle organization fought against this condition, targeting the economically powerful, vigorously fighting the measures of the memorandums. He chose to create conditions of political instability, making it difficult to bleed the social base, leaving behind a great legacy in the international and domestic revolutionary movement. With actions against predatory “organizations” – Bank of Greece, City Bank, etc. -, the stock market, the uniformed killers of the MAT, he defended the armed social revolution, writing new chapters in the book of revolutionary history.

And maybe comrade Lambro Fouda and I have never met, never met, never fought side by side. But the thread of revolutionary memory bridges exactly this: fighters, movements and struggles that, while they developed in different corners of the planet and in different spaces and times, shared a common anguish and vision for liberation. Thus, the preservation of revolutionary memory is anything but a neutral process. It is a thorn in oblivion and a crack in the history of the rulers. That is why securing it is part of our own struggle, part of the present and the future. That is why, although the past was painted with blood, our dead managed to fill the inkwell of revolutionary history. And even if we hadn’t walked next to them, we had walked alongside them. And even if we hadn’t chosen the same path, we looked at the same skies. Because we shared the same dreams and hopes, experienced the same fears and rages. Thus, their struggle, the way they acted and the way they fell is an invitational struggle, a starting point and an occasion for new cycles of resistance. And as long as we keep the revolutionary memory alive, we also keep our history alive. A story built on the smiles and companionable looks of our own people, our own friends and our own partners. As did our comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris, who fell fighting almost a year and a half ago on 31.10.24, from the explosion in Ampelokipi. A comrade who envisioned a world of equality and freedom. A just world, built on the ruins of the old.

So for Lambros Fountas, Kyriakos Ximitiris and all the other fighters who saw themselves as part of the revolutionary history and poured themselves into the battle, it is our turn to make their death a cause of war. To stand worthy of our history and responsibilities and to perceive their death as a motivation to continue the struggle.

LAMBROS FOUNTAS IMMORTAL

KYRIAKOS XYMITIRIS PRESENT

IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF COMRADE NIKOS MAZIOTIS

END THE FINANCIAL HOSTAGE OF COMRADE POLA ROUPA IMMEDIATELY

Marianna Manoura

Dimitra Zarafeta

Korydallos Women’s Prisons.

Source: https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1640123/

On the Trail of the Struggle: Lambros Fountas Present

by Marianna Manoura & Dimitra Zarafeta

On March 10, 16 years ago, Lambros Fountas, a member of the Revolutionary Struggle organization, was shot dead by the police. The murder of the anarchist comrade took place during the preparatory action of the organization in Dafni during an armed clash with the police forces.

The anarchist movement from the very first days defended and continues to defend the memory and content of the action of the armed fighter Lambros Foudas through marches, events, actions. The very organization of which he was a member carried out a blow to the Bank of Greece in 2014, dedicating it to his fallen comrade, taking responsibility under the signature “Commando Lambros Foundas”, thus paying tribute to the revolutionary.

Lambros Fountas, as a member of the armed revolutionary organization Revolutionary Struggle, chose to act through the armed proletarian counterattack at a time when the social base was affected by austerity measures. Measures imposed by the local and international elite in order to avoid the bankruptcy of the European banking system. And while politicians and channel managers present the memorandums and contracts as “means of salvation”, we experienced them as salary and pension cuts, as an impoverished today and as an uncertain tomorrow.

The Revolutionary Struggle organization fought against this condition, targeting the economically powerful, vigorously fighting the measures of the memorandums. He chose to create conditions of political instability, making it difficult to bleed the social base, leaving behind a great legacy in the international and domestic revolutionary movement. With actions against predatory “organizations” – Bank of Greece, City Bank, etc. -, the stock market, the uniformed killers of the MAT, he defended the armed social revolution, writing new chapters in the book of revolutionary history.

And maybe comrade Lambro Fouda and I have never met, never met, never fought side by side. But the thread of revolutionary memory bridges exactly this: fighters, movements and struggles that, while they developed in different corners of the planet and in different spaces and times, shared a common anguish and vision for liberation. Thus, the preservation of revolutionary memory is anything but a neutral process. It is a thorn in oblivion and a crack in the history of the rulers. That is why securing it is part of our own struggle, part of the present and the future. That is why, although the past was painted with blood, our dead managed to fill the inkwell of revolutionary history. And even if we hadn’t walked next to them, we had walked alongside them. And even if we hadn’t chosen the same path, we looked at the same skies. Because we shared the same dreams and hopes, experienced the same fears and rages. Thus, their struggle, the way they acted and the way they fell is an invitational struggle, a starting point and an occasion for new cycles of resistance. And as long as we keep the revolutionary memory alive, we also keep our history alive. A story built on the smiles and companionable looks of our own people, our own friends and our own partners. As did our comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris, who fell fighting almost a year and a half ago on 31.10.24, from the explosion in Ampelokipi. A comrade who envisioned a world of equality and freedom. A just world, built on the ruins of the old.

So for Lambros Fountas, Kyriakos Ximitiris and all the other fighters who saw themselves as part of the revolutionary history and poured themselves into the battle, it is our turn to make their death a cause of war. To stand worthy of our history and responsibilities and to perceive their death as a motivation to continue the struggle.

LAMBROS FOUNTAS IMMORTAL

KYRIAKOS XYMITIRIS PRESENT

IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF COMRADE NIKOS MAZIOTIS

END THE FINANCIAL HOSTAGE OF COMRADE POLA ROUPA IMMEDIATELY

Marianna Manoura

Dimitra Zarafeta

Korydallos Women’s Prisons.

Source: https://athens.indymedia.org/post/1640123/

(Athens) Intervention at the Offices of “Efimerida ton Syntakton” (EFSYN)

This text was published in the course of an intervention at EFSYN in Athens, Greece and translated by the Berlin Assembly in memory of Kyriakos Xymitiris and in solidarity with the persecuted in the Ambelokipi-case.

We are intervening at EFSYN’ in order to publicize the following texts. This intervention follows our presence and the distribution of these texts in the area of Ampelokipi and on Arkadias Street in order to show our solidarity with the residents of the apartment building.

At the same time, we went to the spot where our comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris lost his life.

TEXT FOR THE APARTMENT BUILDING ON ARKADIAS STREET

On 31/10/24, my comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris and I were in the apartment at 4-8 Arkadias Street. During the processing of explosive materials, an explosion occurred that took the life of my 36-year-old comrade, caused my own very serious injury, and resulted in damage to the apartment building. Since then, I have been detained in Korydallos women’s prison under horrendous conditions, having to confront the loss of the person closest to me, my own injury, and very serious accusations.

This explosion obviously was not part of any plan, nor did it happen due to carelessness. This tragic development was the consequence of defective material, something that unfortunately could not be foreseen.

The anarchist political space to which we both belong fights for a world of equality, solidarity, and self-organization. For a world where monthly survival does not cause anxiety, where interpersonal relationships are not based on competition, and where a life in dignity is not a matter of luck. And when this anarchist political space chooses to attack those who impose poverty, exclusion, and insecurity with such means, it takes all necessary measures, often putting the acting subjects themselves at risk, in order to ensure the safety of unrelated people.

Beyond protecting people’s physical integrity, our political spectrum targets those who oppress and exploit us. It sets its sights on the powerful of this world. Those who eat with golden spoons while we make do with the absolute necessities, those who live off rents while we beg that there not be yet another increase, those who reap profit while we work twelve-hour a day. Those who spread death through wars, misery through high prices, fear through racism, extermination through long and uninsured labor. Those who impose uncertainty, insecurity, danger even when you simply take the night train to Thessaloniki or try to cross the border for a life with dignity.

We struggle so that all of this does not remain unanswered. To win back the right to live. To put a stop to injustice, exploitation, oppression, cover-ups. Within this struggle we risk much, we are targeted, we receive violence and repression, we endanger our safety, our freedom, and sometimes even our lives. Not because we are indifferent to life, but because we care about the life of our struggle and then we feel responsible for many people. Thus, we consciously set social solidarity as a priority.

My comrade adopted this stance in life, and that is why he decided to struggle with all means. And if he was still here, he would be the first to try to help the residents of the apartment building, not because he would regret the means he chose to struggle with, but because for him, as for all of us, solidarity and mutual aid are a deeply human feeling, a driving force that pushes us to action.

“We are not terrorists, nor criminals. It is precisely because of our love for life, because we rejoice in the human spirit, that we became fighters for freedom against this racist and deadly imperialist system.”

Marianna Manoura
Korydallos Women’s Prison

Statement on the explosion on Arkadias Street

More than a year has passed since the explosion in the apartment of Arkadias Street, an explosion that was destined to change the lives of dozens of people forever. Residents of the apartment building, a few minutes after the explosion, go to the apartment to see what has happened. There they find the very seriously injured comrade Marianna Manoura, and also the dead comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris. A few hours later the building is sealed for inspection by the anti-terrorism unit while dozens of media outlets rush to break the news and spread a climate of terror. Within a few days, the apartment building is declared uninhabitable.

From our side, as the Assembly of Solidarity with imprisoned, fugitives and persecuted fighters, we express our solidarity with the people who lost their homes in the explosion on October 31. Our struggle seeks connection with those parts that are hit by the plunder spread by state and capitalism. In every neighborhood, every home, where people of our class are found, we promote unmediated struggles, we promote taking our lives into our own hands, until everyone is free, until the demolition of every cell, until we build a world that will include us all. At the same time that high prices continue to rise, working hours increase, people are thrown into the streets by evictions, basic rights such as public health are continuously struck for the interests of the bosses, the state attempts to present our comrades as anti-social elements who try to spoil the polished democracy of the country. This democracy in which one scandal springs up after another, in which hundreds of workers are killed in the labor camps, thousands of migrant women die at the borders, while dozens live on the edge of poverty. All these are the people who are consciously thrown to the margins, exploited, oppressed, murdered.

In the apartment, an attempt was made for the daily struggle against every oppression and authority to become flesh and bone, also through armed struggle. An attempt was made to materialize the dream that a world of solidarity, equality, mutual aid can exist. No matter how much they steal of our lives, no matter how many wars they spread across the globe, no matter how much they terrorize through the media, no matter how overwhelming their superiority in arms may be; the justice of the struggle and the thirst for life will defeat them. This same hope that lived inside the apartment on Arkadias Street is what followed comrades Kyriakos and Marianna in every choice until October 31 and continues to follow comrade Marianna in the daily struggles she gives while imprisoned in the cells of democracy. The thirst for life is what fueled the daily struggles given by the comrades for the improvement of this world, from the struggles to defend the Exarchia neighborhood against gentrification and repression, the struggles for imprisoned comrades who through solidarity manage to surpass the prison bars and connect the common struggles for life inside and outside the prisons, and countless other daily battles and choices which show us that those whom the state calls terrorists are those who live daily among us, who struggle with us against every attempt to degrade our lives and ultimately are those who stand at the side of the oppressed of this world.

In contrast, however, to the state and its ideological mechanisms, the anarchist idea stands against and consciously acts against the logic of collateral damage, which now parades as evidence of guilt regarding means and choices of struggle that the comrades paid for in the harshest way. The offensive actions of anarchists are targeted operations that prioritize the safety of anyone who might pass through the area. Therefore, the explosion inside the apartment and the hardship caused to so many people could never have been the comrades’ objective, no matter how much the state mechanism tries to burden them with the label of “public danger.”

The explosion, which resulted to the death of our comrade, as well as the evacuation from the building of those who lived in the apartments on Arkadias Street, is politically instrumentalized from the first second, while, in a crescendo of hypocrisy, the damage to the apartment building is assigned for repair to TERNA, the well-known company and state partner through direct public contracts, which has entered into cooperation with the murderous state of Israel and is involved in the scandal with the hollow dams in Volos, in the construction of the new type C prisons, in the covering over of the crime scene of Tempi and the plunder of entire areas in the name of “green development.” Many months later the state announces compensation to the tenants, attempting to show a face of care, a care that it did not grant to the victims of the flood in Thessalia, in Mati and other similar areas which are burned by fires, as well to the earthquake’s victims in Crete and elsewhere. In this specific case carrying out a communication trick that aimed on the one hand to ”feed” the climate of terror and on the other to divert the discussion from the killing in Tempi.

The comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris made choices of struggle that contain enormous commitment, consistency, and cost. Armed struggle and urban guerrilla warfare, contains this cost, the risk even to one’s own life. However much you believe that you control all the factors, that you have measured them correctly, there is this unpredictable factor that cannot be calculated. There are dozens of stories of people around the world who lost their lives in such a harsh way.

People devoted to the revolutionary cause die from the very means they chose in order to attack their oppressors. History often proves harsh for those who chose the path of guerrilla warfare. No one made lightly or irresponsibly the choice to put their life and freedom at risk. This choice arose from their experience in life, from social injustice, the imposition of domination and the repression of authority. Of an authority that plunders all our lives without calculating any cost, with profit and omnipotence as its only criteria. All those who lost their lives from a premature explosion of a preparatory action or in the action itself had a common purpose, liberation. The guerrilla fighter is flesh of the flesh of society, a part of it that listens to and experiences its oppressions, that struggles against the omnipotence of states and capital, that fights by all means for the overthrow of the existing system.

On this path sometimes the price we are called to pay is heavy, comrades fall in battle, our comrades are confined in cells.

For this reason we do not forget our comrades who are prosecuted for the Ampelokipoi case and have been in pre-trial detention for more than a year. The road to freedom is always open no matter how difficult it may seem. It is enough to believe in our strength, it is enough to believe that we will succeed. One next to the other.

Assembly of Solidarity with imprisoned, fugitives, and persecuted fighters.

(Athens) Intervention at the Offices of “Efimerida ton Syntakton” (EFSYN)

This text was published in the course of an intervention at EFSYN in Athens, Greece and translated by the Berlin Assembly in memory of Kyriakos Xymitiris and in solidarity with the persecuted in the Ambelokipi-case.

We are intervening at EFSYN’ in order to publicize the following texts. This intervention follows our presence and the distribution of these texts in the area of Ampelokipi and on Arkadias Street in order to show our solidarity with the residents of the apartment building.

At the same time, we went to the spot where our comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris lost his life.

TEXT FOR THE APARTMENT BUILDING ON ARKADIAS STREET

On 31/10/24, my comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris and I were in the apartment at 4-8 Arkadias Street. During the processing of explosive materials, an explosion occurred that took the life of my 36-year-old comrade, caused my own very serious injury, and resulted in damage to the apartment building. Since then, I have been detained in Korydallos women’s prison under horrendous conditions, having to confront the loss of the person closest to me, my own injury, and very serious accusations.

This explosion obviously was not part of any plan, nor did it happen due to carelessness. This tragic development was the consequence of defective material, something that unfortunately could not be foreseen.

The anarchist political space to which we both belong fights for a world of equality, solidarity, and self-organization. For a world where monthly survival does not cause anxiety, where interpersonal relationships are not based on competition, and where a life in dignity is not a matter of luck. And when this anarchist political space chooses to attack those who impose poverty, exclusion, and insecurity with such means, it takes all necessary measures, often putting the acting subjects themselves at risk, in order to ensure the safety of unrelated people.

Beyond protecting people’s physical integrity, our political spectrum targets those who oppress and exploit us. It sets its sights on the powerful of this world. Those who eat with golden spoons while we make do with the absolute necessities, those who live off rents while we beg that there not be yet another increase, those who reap profit while we work twelve-hour a day. Those who spread death through wars, misery through high prices, fear through racism, extermination through long and uninsured labor. Those who impose uncertainty, insecurity, danger even when you simply take the night train to Thessaloniki or try to cross the border for a life with dignity.

We struggle so that all of this does not remain unanswered. To win back the right to live. To put a stop to injustice, exploitation, oppression, cover-ups. Within this struggle we risk much, we are targeted, we receive violence and repression, we endanger our safety, our freedom, and sometimes even our lives. Not because we are indifferent to life, but because we care about the life of our struggle and then we feel responsible for many people. Thus, we consciously set social solidarity as a priority.

My comrade adopted this stance in life, and that is why he decided to struggle with all means. And if he was still here, he would be the first to try to help the residents of the apartment building, not because he would regret the means he chose to struggle with, but because for him, as for all of us, solidarity and mutual aid are a deeply human feeling, a driving force that pushes us to action.

“We are not terrorists, nor criminals. It is precisely because of our love for life, because we rejoice in the human spirit, that we became fighters for freedom against this racist and deadly imperialist system.”

Marianna Manoura
Korydallos Women’s Prison

Statement on the explosion on Arkadias Street

More than a year has passed since the explosion in the apartment of Arkadias Street, an explosion that was destined to change the lives of dozens of people forever. Residents of the apartment building, a few minutes after the explosion, go to the apartment to see what has happened. There they find the very seriously injured comrade Marianna Manoura, and also the dead comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris. A few hours later the building is sealed for inspection by the anti-terrorism unit while dozens of media outlets rush to break the news and spread a climate of terror. Within a few days, the apartment building is declared uninhabitable.

From our side, as the Assembly of Solidarity with imprisoned, fugitives and persecuted fighters, we express our solidarity with the people who lost their homes in the explosion on October 31. Our struggle seeks connection with those parts that are hit by the plunder spread by state and capitalism. In every neighborhood, every home, where people of our class are found, we promote unmediated struggles, we promote taking our lives into our own hands, until everyone is free, until the demolition of every cell, until we build a world that will include us all. At the same time that high prices continue to rise, working hours increase, people are thrown into the streets by evictions, basic rights such as public health are continuously struck for the interests of the bosses, the state attempts to present our comrades as anti-social elements who try to spoil the polished democracy of the country. This democracy in which one scandal springs up after another, in which hundreds of workers are killed in the labor camps, thousands of migrant women die at the borders, while dozens live on the edge of poverty. All these are the people who are consciously thrown to the margins, exploited, oppressed, murdered.

In the apartment, an attempt was made for the daily struggle against every oppression and authority to become flesh and bone, also through armed struggle. An attempt was made to materialize the dream that a world of solidarity, equality, mutual aid can exist. No matter how much they steal of our lives, no matter how many wars they spread across the globe, no matter how much they terrorize through the media, no matter how overwhelming their superiority in arms may be; the justice of the struggle and the thirst for life will defeat them. This same hope that lived inside the apartment on Arkadias Street is what followed comrades Kyriakos and Marianna in every choice until October 31 and continues to follow comrade Marianna in the daily struggles she gives while imprisoned in the cells of democracy. The thirst for life is what fueled the daily struggles given by the comrades for the improvement of this world, from the struggles to defend the Exarchia neighborhood against gentrification and repression, the struggles for imprisoned comrades who through solidarity manage to surpass the prison bars and connect the common struggles for life inside and outside the prisons, and countless other daily battles and choices which show us that those whom the state calls terrorists are those who live daily among us, who struggle with us against every attempt to degrade our lives and ultimately are those who stand at the side of the oppressed of this world.

In contrast, however, to the state and its ideological mechanisms, the anarchist idea stands against and consciously acts against the logic of collateral damage, which now parades as evidence of guilt regarding means and choices of struggle that the comrades paid for in the harshest way. The offensive actions of anarchists are targeted operations that prioritize the safety of anyone who might pass through the area. Therefore, the explosion inside the apartment and the hardship caused to so many people could never have been the comrades’ objective, no matter how much the state mechanism tries to burden them with the label of “public danger.”

The explosion, which resulted to the death of our comrade, as well as the evacuation from the building of those who lived in the apartments on Arkadias Street, is politically instrumentalized from the first second, while, in a crescendo of hypocrisy, the damage to the apartment building is assigned for repair to TERNA, the well-known company and state partner through direct public contracts, which has entered into cooperation with the murderous state of Israel and is involved in the scandal with the hollow dams in Volos, in the construction of the new type C prisons, in the covering over of the crime scene of Tempi and the plunder of entire areas in the name of “green development.” Many months later the state announces compensation to the tenants, attempting to show a face of care, a care that it did not grant to the victims of the flood in Thessalia, in Mati and other similar areas which are burned by fires, as well to the earthquake’s victims in Crete and elsewhere. In this specific case carrying out a communication trick that aimed on the one hand to ”feed” the climate of terror and on the other to divert the discussion from the killing in Tempi.

The comrade Kyriakos Xymitiris made choices of struggle that contain enormous commitment, consistency, and cost. Armed struggle and urban guerrilla warfare, contains this cost, the risk even to one’s own life. However much you believe that you control all the factors, that you have measured them correctly, there is this unpredictable factor that cannot be calculated. There are dozens of stories of people around the world who lost their lives in such a harsh way.

People devoted to the revolutionary cause die from the very means they chose in order to attack their oppressors. History often proves harsh for those who chose the path of guerrilla warfare. No one made lightly or irresponsibly the choice to put their life and freedom at risk. This choice arose from their experience in life, from social injustice, the imposition of domination and the repression of authority. Of an authority that plunders all our lives without calculating any cost, with profit and omnipotence as its only criteria. All those who lost their lives from a premature explosion of a preparatory action or in the action itself had a common purpose, liberation. The guerrilla fighter is flesh of the flesh of society, a part of it that listens to and experiences its oppressions, that struggles against the omnipotence of states and capital, that fights by all means for the overthrow of the existing system.

On this path sometimes the price we are called to pay is heavy, comrades fall in battle, our comrades are confined in cells.

For this reason we do not forget our comrades who are prosecuted for the Ampelokipoi case and have been in pre-trial detention for more than a year. The road to freedom is always open no matter how difficult it may seem. It is enough to believe in our strength, it is enough to believe that we will succeed. One next to the other.

Assembly of Solidarity with imprisoned, fugitives, and persecuted fighters.