Greece

 GREEK ASSOCIATION OF CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTORS

PRESS RELEASE

Tomorrow, 16/06/2015, the case of conscientious objector Dimitris K. Sotiropoulos will be heard before the Appeal Military Court of Athens. Sotiropoulos, 48 years old and a founding member of the Greek Association of Conscientious Objectors, has refused to enlist since 1992, declared publicly his opposition to violence and militarism, and asked to perform an equal alternative civilian service. At first instance, and having already been exempted from conscription as a father of 3 children, he was sentenced to a 10-month suspended imprisonment sentence, 23 years after his initial insubordination. Among others, the Vice-President of the European Bureau for Conscientious Objection (EBCO) Sam Biesemans will testify in his defense, who came from Brussels for this purpose.

14 April, 2014, Athens: Global Day of Action on Military Spending action in Athens, Greece, organised by World without Wars and Violence with the support of the European Bureau for Conscientious Objection, to demand the decrease of military spending and the increase of social spending.

Following a meeting in Cyprus of conscientious objector and war refuser movements in the Eastern Mediterranean region at the end of January, when CO in Cyprus Murat Kanatlı (and co-organiser of the meeting in Nicosia) was imprisoned for ten days in February, solidarity actions took place in Turkey, Greece and Israel (by Druze Palestinian objectors). In Athens, activists were temporarily detained for their protest at the Turkish embassy. Watch a video of activists in Istanbul here.

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Action against the imprisonment of Omar Saad in front of the Greek Parliament at 'Syntagma' Square (Constitution Square) in Athens. 6th April 2014, by activists from Amnesty International in Greece.

Hannah from the Right to Refuse to Kill programme was in Athens this month for the launch of the European Bureau for Conscientious Objection's report on the status of conscientious objection in Europe.

First, received 12th September, 2013

Following the huge increase in the persecution of COs in Greece since the beginning of the year, the Association of COs in Greece has issued an open letter calling for support. It's available in English, French, German and Spanish.

Athens, 01/07/2013

Dear friends and supporters,

As we reported in the previous CO Update, conscientious objectors in Greece have been subject to new cycles of detention and trial since the beginning of the year. Last time, we reported on the situations of Nikos Karanikas, Charalabos Akrivopoulos, Menelaos Exioglou and Dimitris Sotiropulos.

Since the beginning of the year, a crackdown on conscientious objectors (and maybe draft evaders in general) has taken place in Greece. The arrest of 44 year old Nikolaos Karanikas in February, followed by that of 37 year old Haralampos Akrivopoulos in March, and of 30 year old Menelaos Exioglou in April, were the first after many years of relative calm. In this period, COs who were total objectors or refused to accept a punitive alternative service were still prosecuted and sentenced (some times in absentia) - to suspended prison sentences, in military courts - but without arrests.

Over the past months, there has been a dramatic upswing in the persecution of conscientious objectors in Greece. All of those listed below have already been tried or imprisoned, some over twenty years ago, and they now face further legal action against them.

These cases include