Protesters and VICE Journalists Were Injured by Greek Cops on Monday Night

This post originally appeared in VICE Greece

On Monday night 35,000 people took to the streets of Athens to commemorate the anniversary of the bloody 1973 Polytechnic ​uprising against the Greek military junta. About five hours north, in the city of Thessalonica, an estimated 10,000 people gathered in remembrance as well. Both instances were marked by an oppressive presence of riot police. According to reports, more than 7,000 officers were deployed to "safeguard" and "monitor" the marches.

​Human rights violations by police officers during demonstrations are a commonplace occurrence in Greece, and Monday was no exception. Cops clashed with students, passers-by, and demonstrators in the Athens district of Exarcheia, and by the end of the night ​about a dozen people had been injured, according to local media. Among them were two VICE journalists, Antonis Diniakos and Alexia Tsagkari.

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Alexia Tsagkari, who was filming the demonstration for VICE News, was attacked by riot police in downtown Athens outside the Hilton building after clashes broke out between the anarchist bloc and the officers. A policeman hit Tsagkari on the head with a baton before dragging her by her hair while a second officer kicked her to the ground.

Things in Athens escalated quickly and reports of police violence poured in. Diniakos reported that "Gangs of riot police soared through the narrow streets of Exarcheia on their bikes, batons in their fists, terrorizing local residents and protesters." Policemen ​allegedly raided a kiosk in Exarcheia Square, injuring two people who worked there.

The attack on Diniakos occurred when he confronted a group of Delta and Dias motorcycle police brigades he says were harassing a group of pedestrians.

"The riot police squads surrounded them, and one of them raised his baton to intimidate the group. I ran to record the incident with my cell phone, at which point a riot police officer hit my leg with the front wheel of his motorbike. I shouted at him to stop. Three police officers ran toward me and threw me on the ground. They held me by the throat and hands. The police stopped hitting me only after my colleagues provided them with our IDs, which indicated we were accredited journalists," said Diniakos.

In addition to VICE's reporters, a journalist from MEGA TV was allegedly attacked by cops on Monday as well. A criminal and disciplinary investigation has been ordered into the assaults against reporters.

Monday's rally came a few days after the PanHellenic high-school  ​occupations and last week's riot police attacks that resulted in the injury of two university students. VICE spoke to the injured students last week, who told us that the attack on them was "unprovoked" and "unnecessary."

VICE Greece journalist Kostas Koukoumakas, who was on the ground in Thessaloniki, reported that "the riot police presence was so strong that, for the first time in many years, protesters stopped the march several times demanding that the police leave the demonstration. The protesters chanted continuously in vain, 'Get the police out of the rally now.' Clashes between the police and the demonstrators broke out moments later. The riot police threw tear gas at the crowd, who escaped through the nearby streets."

Unfortunately, the use of excessive force has become the norm here.  After the mass march in Athens came to an end, we received reports that riot police had used teargas excessively in the district of Exarheia. Amnesty International has noted that this is a tactic commonly used by police forces in Greece during demonstrations, in clear violation of international standards. Journalists are of course not immune to this, but the violence that is geared toward them is a special kind that holds a specific purpose: to censor the press.

The decision to keep using the police as a means of suppression is a political one. It is high time Greek authorities acknowledged this, and stopped allowing the riot police squads to act like gangs of hooligans terrorizing the streets of Greece. It seems unlikely that they will, as last night after the rioting the minister of public order, Vassilis Kikilias, visited the Athens police headquarters to congratulate the officers on a job well done.