Today (4th of April 2012), a retired pharmacist Dimitris Christoulas shot himself in the middle of Syntagma Square. In his suicide note he wrote: 

The Tsolakoglou* occupation government deprived me from any chance of survival. My survival was supported on a decent pension for which I contributed (without any support from the state) for 35 years.

As I am in an age that does not allow for individual active resistance (without excluding the fact that if one Greek was found to take the Kalashnikov, the second would be me), I do not find any other solution that to give a decent end to my life before starting to search in the garbage to find food.

I believe that, some day, the young people without future will take the arms and will hang upside down the national trators in the Syntagma Square as the Italians did in 1945 to Mussolini (Piazza Loreto in Milan).

According to Occupied London: “yesterday evening a 38-year old father of two children, who was unemployed for long time, jumped from the roof of his block in Ierapetra, Crete.”

Later on, approximately 10.000-15.000 people responded to the calls for a peaceful protest in Syntagma Square. The riot police arrived, and attempted to disperse the gathering using flash-sound grenades and chemicals leaving one protester seriously injured. The square was evacuated around 22:50.

Clashes took place also in the city of Thessaloniki, where the police without reason attacked a peaceful group of demonstrators. Street battles took place with the protesters trying to defend their right to assemble.

Also, demonstrations are called all over the country and the slogan “We won’t let Capitalism kill us”.

Below, videos and photos from Syntagma Square.

Note: * Georgios Tsolakoglou was a Greek Military Officer who became Prime Minister during the Axis Occupation in 1941-1942. His government was in absolute collaboration with the Nazi forces. In his letter, the pensioner makes a parallelism of Tsolagoglou with the Papademos unelected government.

Update 5-4

According to Occupied London calls for anti-regime rally at Syntagma were circulated in the view of political suicide of Dimitris Christoulas. The rally was attacked without any reason by the police, who beat up dozens of people and detained 20 (including a 13-year-old who was charged for “resistance against the authorities”. Police targeted demonstrators but also photo-journalists who covered police brutality.

Also, the president of the photo-journalists union Marios Lolos was attacked by riot police and got a crack on his scull. He was immediately hospitalised, and undertook brain surgery. The photo-journalists union on 12th of Feb. 2012 issued a condemnation of police and mass media bosses for using/providing media photos and video footage for police purposes, making clear that the union do not permit police to use their work for its purposes. (Check also the announcement of Reporters Without Borders)

Update 7-4

Video from the funeral of Dimitris Christoulas in Athens…

Short URL: http://wp.me/pyR3u-aqx

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