[300] Hunger strike to start tomorrow

Short Update on the upcoming Hunger Strike for Legalisation in Greece. First of all, there is a new blog that will cover the hunger strike in Greek language: hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net. We will try to get as much content as possible translated on this site. You can follow all updates in this category: hungerstrike300 (rss).
So much for the technicalities. In the meanwhile, about 300 hunger strikers have arrived from Chania, Crete to join the other hunger strikers in Athens and Thessaloniki. Here is a video of their arrival in the port of Patra

The hunger strike will start tomorrow

ECtHR front kicks Dublin II

Yesterday (21st of January 2011) was a bad day for the Dublin II system. The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg judged Belgium and Greece for violating European Convention on Human Rights.
In the case MSS v Belgium and Greece an Afghan asylum seeker appealed against his deportion from Belgium to Greece based on the Dublin II-Regulation, that was carried out in June 2009. Subject of the proceedings were article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment), article 13 (right to an effective remedy) as well as article 2 (right to life).
Below you will find an extract of the decision. Within the next days we will post more information, including how this judgement could effect the future of Dublin II-Regulation.

A violation of Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment) of the European Convention on Human Rights by Greece both because of the applicant’s detention conditions and because of his living conditions in Greece;
A violation of Article 13 (right to an effective remedy) taken together with Article 3 by Greece because of the deficiencies in the asylum procedure followed in the applicant’s case;
A violation of Article 3 by Belgium both because of having exposed the applicant to risks linked to the deficiencies in the asylum procedure in Greece and because of having exposed him to detention and living conditions in Greece that were in breach of Article 3;
A violation of Article 13 taken together with Article 3 by Belgium because of the lack of an effective remedy against the applicant’s expulsion order

25th of January 300 migrants will go on hunger strike in Greece

Announcement by the Assembly of Migrant Hunger Strikers

We are migrant men and women from all over Greece. We came here due to poverty, unemployment, wars and dictatorships. The multinational companies and their political servants did not leave another choice for us than risking 10 times our lives to arrive in Europe’s door. The West that is depriving our countries while having much better living conditions is our only chance to live as humans. We came (either with regular entry or not) in Greece and we are working to support ourselves and our families. We live without dignity, in the darkness of illegalness in order to benefit employers and state’s services from the harsh exploitation of our labor. We live from our sweat and with the dream, some day, to have equal rights with our Greek fellow workers.
During the last period our life has become even more unbearable. As salaries and pensions are cut and everything is getting more expensive, the migrants are presented as those to blame, as those whose fault is the abjection and harsh exploitation of greek workers and small businessman. The propaganda of fascist and racist parties and groups is nowadays the official state discourse for issues of migration. The far right discourse is reproduced through media when they talk about us. The “proposals” of the far right are announced as governmental policies: wall in Evros, floating detention centers and European army in the Aegean, repression in the cities, massive deportations. They want to convince greek workers that, all in a sudden, we are a threat to them, that we are to blame for the unprecedented attack from their own governments.
The answer to the lies and the cruelty has to be given now and it will come from us, from migrant men and women. We are going in the front line, with our own lives to stop this injustice. We ask the legalization of all migrant men and women, we ask for equal political and social rights and obligations with greek workers. We ask from our greek fellow workers, from every person suffering from exploitation to stand next to us. We ask them to support our struggle. Not to let the lie, the injustice, the fascism and the autarchy of the political and economic elites to be dominant in their own places too; all these conditions that are dominant in our countries and led us to migrate, us and our children, in order to be able to live with dignity.
We don’t have another way to make our voices heard, to make you learn about our rights. Three hundred (300) of us will start a Hunger Strike in Athens and in Thessaloniki, in the 25th of January. We risk our lives, as, one way or another, this is no life for people with dignity. We prefer to die here rather our children to suffer what we have been through.
January 2011
Assembly of migrant hunger strikers