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A New Dawn? Change and Continuity in

Political Violence in GreeceSappho Xenakis

ab

aCentre de Recherches Sociologiques sur le Droit et les Institutions

Pnales (CESDIP), Versailles, France

bUniversit de Versailles, Versailles, FrancePublished online: 15 Jun 2012.

To cite this article:Sappho Xenakis (2012): A New Dawn? Change and Continuity in Political Violencein Greece, Terrorism and Political Violence, 24:3, 437-464

To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2011.633133

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A New Dawn? Change and Continuity inPolitical Violence in Greece

SAPPHO XENAKIS

Centre de Recherches Sociologiques sur le Droit et les InstitutionsPenales (CESDIP); and Universitede Versailles, Versailles, France

With the arrest and conviction of members of the Greek Revolutionary Organization17 November in the early 2000s, the chapter appeared to be closing on one of the last

of a generation of urban guerrillas in Western Europe. Before the end of that decade,however, not only had a new batch of violent political organizations arisen in Greece,but the country had also experienced its worst social unrest in over thirty years. Witha view to helping fill an emerging descriptive and analytical gap, this article sum-marizes key features of political violence in Greece between 1974 and 2011, and high-lights the importance of three factors to explaining the resumption of organized

political violence in the 2000s: the socio-economic environment, the treatment of rad-ical demands by the political system, and the dynamics of violence between the stateand non-state groups. In so doing, the article includes an unprecedented account ofthe role of the state and far-right organizations in the escalation of political violencein Greece. The article goes on to critically review expert, political, and mediaaccounts of the evolution of political violence in the country, and concludes by con-sidering pertinent policy implications.

Keywords anarchism, counterterrorism, far-right violence, Greece, internationalco-operation, political violence

Over the past thirty-seven years, Greeks have lived through a period characterized byan unprecedented degree of democratic stability. The same period has neverthelessseen a range of actors in Greece engage in political violence; namely, the employmentof physical violence to further a political campaign. A variety of sub-state politicalorganizations have employed organized violence more or less covertly as part of their

campaigning during this timeframe. Beyond sub-state organizations, legal and illegalforms of state coercion have also been interpreted by some critics to embody a

Sappho Xenakis is a RBUCE-UP junior fellow at the Centre de Recherches Sociologiquessur le Droit et les Institutions Penales (CESDIP)=Universite de Versailles.

Research for this article was funded by the European Communitys Seventh FrameworkProgramme (FP7=20072013) under grant agreement no. 237163, and was conducted whilstthe author was a Marie Curie Intra-European Fellow at the Hellenic Foundation for Europeanand Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP), Athens, Greece. This article was completed and accepted forpublication in October 2011, and does not take into account developments that have occurredsince. Thanks are due to Nicholas J. Xenakis and Leonidas K. Cheliotis for their invaluablefeedback on earlier drafts, and to the journals anonymous reviewers for their comments.

Address correspondence to Sappho Xenakis, Centre de Recherches Sociologiques sur leDroit et les Institutions Penales (CESDIP), 43 Boulevard Vauban, Guyancourt 78280, France.E-mail: [email protected]

Terrorism and Political Violence, 24:437464, 2012Copyright # Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 0954-6553 print=1556-1836 onlineDOI: 10.1080/09546553.2011.633133

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politicized application of the use of force, and a small but diverse cross-section of thegeneral public has been prepared to support and engage in spontaneous minor actsof violence during political protests. Since the fall of the countrys militarydictatorship in 1974, however, official and scholarly discourse concerning political

violence in Greece has concentrated on organized attacks perpetrated by far-leftand anarchist groups more specifically.1

Similar to the experience of other states in Western Europe, the vast majority ofrecorded incidents of violence perpetrated by far-left and anarchist groups in Greecesince the 1970s have involved the use of explosives against symbolic targets, causingfew casualties or fatalities. What is notable about the Greek case is that attacks in thecountry have occurred in cycles that appear relatively regular. According to the Glo-bal Terrorism Database, fairly similar peak numbers of attacks in Greece wererecorded in 1977 (47), in 1991 (59), and in 2007 (53), whilst EUROPOL has noted thatthe rate of attacks in Greece has since continued to rise.2 Perhaps more striking, how-ever, is that neither the Global Terrorism Database nor the EUROPOL TerrorismSituation and Trend Reports have taken into account attacks perpetrated by far-rightorganizations in Greece. This omission, which has prevented a more holistic perspec-tive of organized political violence in the country, has arisen despite the fact that bothsources chart occurrences of far-right organized violence in other states, and that suchactivities are also recorded by Greek and European non-governmental organizationsand media outlets, although not by the Greek state itself. At any rate, the availableevidence concerning the relative regularity of cycles of political violence in Greeceis sufficient to warrant greater academic attention than it has received to date.

Following the arrest of members of one of the countrys longest active far-leftisturban guerrilla groups in 2002, most scholarly opinion concluded that a recent hard-

ening of political attitudes towards terrorism and greater levels of investment incounter-terrorism security infrastructure (technology, training, and legislation) hadbeen highly effective.3 Moreover, the successful conviction of group members in2003 was widely seen as marking the demise of the last and most stubborn of a gen-eration of ideological terrorists in Western Europe.4 Whilst not everyone went sofar as to declare that [a]ll acts of political violence have now ceased in Greece,to the extent that the possibility of a new wave of violence was even considered, itwas an eventuality imagined plausible after an interim of around ten to fifteen years.5

Aside from media coverage, there has been little scholarly output in English orGreek that has offered a descriptive account of the resurgence of political violencein Greece since the 2000s, let alone any that has sought to explain the reasons forthe revival.6 As concerns explanatory accounts, extant academic studies have focusedlargely upon the previous generation of groups active between 1974 and 2003, andhave principally offered analyses of the ideological and psychological make-up ofgroup members, of the organization, targets and strategies of key groups, and ofthe competence displayed by intelligence and law enforcement agencies in capturingthem.7 A continuing focus on these variables by expert, political, and media commen-taries meant not only that the resumption of political violence in the 2000s wasrelatively unexpected, but also that it has, as yet, remained inadequately theorized.

Indeed, systematic attention has yet to be paid to factors that elsewhere inEurope have been found vital to explaining emergent cycles of violence. In her path-

breaking study of German and Italian experiences of political violence between the1960s and the 1990s, Donatella Della Porta proposes that a comprehensive expla-nation of organized political violence requires the integration of macro-, meso-, and

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micro-levels of analysis that respectively address the role of environmental conditions,the internal dynamics of politically violent organizations themselves, and the percep-tions and motivations of group members. Each level of analysis is suggested to be ofgreater significance at a different stage of the cycle of violence: from the emergence

(macro), to the maintenance (meso), to the decline of violent groups (micro).8

Threemacro-level factors are identified by Della Porta as particularly important to explain-ing the emergence of organized political violence: the strains of the socio-economicenvironment, the flexibility of the political establishment towards radical concerns,and the broader dynamics of violent interactions between sub-state groups, andbetween sub-state groups and the state itself.

With a view to addressing the growing descriptive and analytical gap concerningthe resurgence of organized political violence in Greece in the 2000s, this articleoffers a summary of the key features of groups involved in political violence between1974 and 2011, and draws on Della Portas triumvirate of macro-level factors toreview the broader environment in which political violence emerged. In so doing,the article points to the uneven progress of the prosecution and appeals processesfor the first generation of groups active between 1974 and 2003, and providesgreater detail on the context to, and characteristics of, the so-called new gener-ation of groups active since 2003 (covering developments up to late 2011), includingan unprecedented account of the role of the state and far-right organizations in theescalation of political violence over the same period. Expert, political, and mediaaccounts of the evolution of political violence in Greece are critically surveyed, illus-trating their common tendency to overstate both the novel features of the new gen-eration and the effectiveness of counter-measures by the state. The paper concludesby pointing to the policy implications that stem from this macro-analytic approach

to the Greek case.

Organized Political Violence in the Post-Junta Era, 19742002

Recent years have seen official, media, and scholarly recognition paid to the distinc-tive characteristics of two generations of violent political groups in Greece sincethe 1970s. The roots of what may be called the first generation, which engagedin political violence after the fall of the countrys dictatorship of 196774, have beentraced to underground resistance organizations that functioned during the junta.Prior to the junta, the attractions of violent strategies for leftist activists had beenstrengthened by state repression and state-sanctioned violence by covert groups ofthe far-Right. Key to the emergence of organized sub-state political violence wasthe inflexibility of the political establishment towards radical demands, and the widerenvironment of violence between sub-state groups, as well as between sub-stategroups and the state.

Greece had for decades been riven by deep splits between Right and Left undergovernments dominated by the Right, and experienced numerous periods of politicalinstability; from civil war, to military revolts, to periods of military and authoritarianrule. The 1950s were a decade of relative stability, secured by police intimidation andharassment of Leftists and trade unionists, in conjunction with violence meted out bythe so-called parakratos (para-state): that is, clandestine far-right paramilitary

groups closely associated with the state security services. In contrast, the 1960s sawthe effective mobilization of social protest and, in response, an intensification ofrepression by the state and its para-state adjuncts, fuelling, in turn, the radicalization

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groups, such violence was largely under-recorded, under-reported, and understudied,in contrast with the violence of far-left groups.19 Amongst far-Leftists, suspicions asto why this was the case were exacerbated by the apparent leniency shown by theGreek state towards right-wing violence in the aftermath of the dictatorship, and

were compounded by the presence of ministers tainted by an association with fascismwithin the post-junta government.20

The underlying anxiety of the far-Left was that the advent of democracy was amere facade behind which authoritarian governance was continuing. Far-left rep-resentation within the parliamentary system after the dictatorship was neither straightforward nor entirely effective. Whilst the StalinistKKE(Kommounistiko Komma Ella-das, known simply as the KKE) dominated the far-Left, the party had manouevreditself into a reformist position by the time the junta fell and its illegal status was lifted.For this reason, and in light of their persisting efforts to quell mobilization by theanarchist and radical Left, the entry into parliament of the KKE and the Eurocom-munist KKE (KKE-Esoterikou, known as the KKE-es) meant that not all on thefar-Left could be persuaded that their positions would be adequately representedwithin the established political system.21

Revolutionary anti-capitalist commitment was maintained by other far-left asso-ciations (from Maoists and Trotskyists to Italian-inspired autonomist anarchists),some of which subsequently contested parliamentary elections themselves.22 Suchgroups, which sometimes acted in collaboration with one another, were in turn criti-cized by the KKE for being removed from popular concerns and were accused ofbeing provocateurshired by the Right. Where they were able to evade being repelledby the Communists, these groups sought to raise public awareness and support forradical change, organizing political demonstrations, university occupations, and

wildcat strikes.23

The arrival of the first socialist but increasingly centrist Greekgovernment (of PASOK) in 1981 only reinforced their sense of exclusion from thepolitical system.24 It was against this background that smaller groups had formedwith the specific purpose of carrying out violent campaigns of political protest againstwhat they saw as a superficial democratic transformation, castigating the rest for theirdisavowal of such methods, but maintaining between themselves often tense ideologi-cal and practical distinctions.25 Those that gained greatest prominence amongstthese groups were ELA (Epanastatikos Laikos Agonas, or Revolutionary PopularStruggle) and 17N (Epanastatiki Organosi Dekaefta Noemvri, or RevolutionaryOrganization 17 November).

ELA, an organization with Marxist-Leninist roots that aimed to stimulate thedevelopment of a mass revolutionary movement, was formed in 1975 and, until1995 (when it declared an end to its activities), carried out over 100 low-level bomb-ings aimed at symbolic targets of capitalist power (police, banks, government offices,and material and human targets associated with U.S. interests).26 It was affiliatedwith a magazine, Antipliroforisi(Counter-information), which circulated openlyand was available from street-corner shops.27 The group was thought to havedisbanded in response to the opening of Stasi intelligence files in Germany, whichwere believed to have revealed the names of its members.28 In 1979, a sub-sect ofELA calling itselfOmada Iounis 78(Group June 78) assassinated a retired intel-ligence officer and known torturer of the junta.29 Iounis 78 carried out no further acts

and, six years later, their action was claimed by ELA as its own. ELA also becameidentified with the groupProti Mai(May 1), which killed a Deputy Supreme Courtprosecutor in 1989.30 Proti Mai, which was thought by some observers to be



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comprised of members of 17N, operated alone between 1987 and 1989.31 In 1990, inan issue ofAntipliroforisi, ELA announced its alliance with Proti Mai.32 ELA andProti Mai then claimed joint responsibility for an attack in 1994 against a buscontaining riot policemen, in which one, Apostolos Vellios, died and other officers

sustained serious injuries.33

In 2003, six individuals suspected of ELA membership were arrested. The autho-rities were apparently satisfied with their arrests; one official source was cited at thetime stating that, [s]hould we wish to arrest someone of higher rank in the ELA lead-ership, we would have to resurrect Christos Kassimis (the suspected founder of ELA,who had been killed by police during an exchange of fire in 1977).34 During the trial offive of the arrested suspects in 2004, and two months before the sentences wereannounced, the presiding judge was cited commenting that the evidence put forwardby the prosecution was most insufficient, and that political pressure for the trial toconclude before the start of the Olympic Games (August 1329, 2004) had compro-mised the rights of the defendants.35 The trial ended in the acquittal of two and con-viction of four, with the maximum possible sentence of 25 years imposed on thoseconvicted.36 A second trial, in 2005, brought new charges against the six suspects.Two were entirely exonerated, all were acquitted of new charges, and all were foundnot guilty of the murder of Vellios.37 Finally, following a thirteen-month appeal, thefour convicted in 2004 also saw their convictions overturned in December 2009, whenthe court acknowledged the lack of evidence against the individuals concerned.38

The self-described Marxist-Leninist organization 17N, named after the date ofthe student uprising whose crushing by the military heralded the waning of supportfor the dictatorship (and subsequently commemorated by an annual national hol-iday), was publicly launched in 1975 with the murder of the CIA station chief in

Athens. 17N went on to kill a further twenty-two individuals (including a total of fiveU.S. Embassy employees), in addition to numerous bombings and a number of bankrobberies. Their targets were identified by the relation they were judged to have withthe forms of imperialism and corruption that the organization sought to destabilize,whether Greek, U.S., British, Turkish, or NATO. The organizations appearanceswere sporadic and included a temporary ceasefire between October 1981 andmid-1983 following the election of the first socialist (PASOK) government, purport-edly to allow the latter some respite.39

The group began to unravel when, in June 2002, a bomb exploded prematurely inthe hands of group member Savvas Xiros.40 He was taken to hospital where, underquestioning (and allegedly under the influence of drugs administered there), heprovided information that led to a number of other arrests and the discovery of anarms cache. Eventually, nineteen individuals were charged with membership of thegroup. Amongst those arrested was Yiannis Serifis (also a suspected member ofELA), who had previously been charged and acquitted of terrorism in the late1970s during the dictatorship. He was released in December 2002, with the conditionof a430,000 bail payment, following an international campaign of protest at his arrest.Also arrested and subsequently acquitted was the former Trotskyist activist TheologosPsaradellis, who had been imprisoned and tortured under the dictatorship. Psaradellisadmitted participating in a bank robbery in 1986, but both he and Serifis proclaimedthemselves strongly ideologically opposed to the inhumanity of the violence perpe-

trated by 17N. Their arrests heightened concerns that the anti-dictatorship strugglewas purposefully being embroiled in the hunt for 17N by individuals all too keen tosee the anti-dictatorship struggle delegitimized and discredited as a whole.41

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The record nine-month mother of all trials concluded in December 2003, whenthe court convicted fifteen defendants as members of the group and acquitted four(including Serifis and Psaradellis) on grounds of insufficient evidence.42 The statedemonstrated greater success in making the convictions stick after appeals than it had

done in the ELA cases, although some charges were eventually dropped and convictionsagainst two found guilty in 2003 were quashed due to the statute of limitations.43 Thesignificant irregularities which also beset the prosecution and appeal processes of thesuspected ideological leader of the group, Alexandros Giotopoulous, meant that hepursued a further appeal through the European Court of Human Rights.44

Political Violence Since 2000: Socio-Economic Strains, Political Radicalism,and the Spectrum of Violent Actors

Following the apparent dismantling in the early 2000s of violent groups run by the gen-eration shaped by anti-dictatorship struggles, common expectations of a decline inpolitical violence were clearly challenged by its resurgence. Assessments that, fromthe 1990s onwards, Greek political culture had been becoming increasingly moderateappeared overly optimistic as the frequency of recorded attacks by the new gener-ation of covert far-left and anarchist associations rose in 2007, and gathered momen-tum after the social unrest of December 2008.45 Over the course of the same decade,incidents of violence by the police continued to surface and those by far-right groupsintensified. In late 2010, numerous arrests were made of suspected members of the newgeneration, the impact of which is as yet unclear. As discussed below, and in line withDella Portas schema as presented in the introduction, behind the resurgence oforganized political violence in the 2000s was a highly conducive socio-economic

environment, a political establishment closed to radical demands, and a broader con-text of violence between sub-state groups, and between sub-state groups and the state.

As the decade progressed, increasing unemployment (particularly high amongstthe youth), steeply rising levels of household debt, successive grand corruption scan-dals, and financial crisis, fuelled social pressures and anxieties.46 Such pressures haveto some extent been captured by successive pan-European public opinion surveys inwhich Greeks have reported significantly lower levels of trust in their countrys publicinstitutions than the majority of their European counterparts have reported fortheirs.47 The extensiveness of these anxieties appears, occasionally, to have drawnsome political protesters towards spontaneous participation in violence (both Greeksand foreigners, and a wide range of age groups, even if the youth have been dispro-portionately represented), as spectacularly demonstrated in the protests of December2008, but also in mass demonstrations since then.48 According to a public opinionpoll carried out by the company Kappa Research in late 2010 and early 2011 onreactions to the countrys financial crisis, 14% percent of respondents recognizedviolence as a legitimate means of expression and making claims, whilst 10% expressedtoleration towards the perpetration of damage to buildings and shops.49

Radicalization has not inevitably implied support for the legitimation of violentpolitical strategies. Prominent radical Leftists have spoken out against all forms of polit-ical violence, pointing to the mutually reinforcing nature of state and non-state viol-ence.50 The KKE has been staunch in its opposition to, and suspicion of, what it has

characterized as the self-defeating nature of contemporary political violence. Indeed,broader public skepticism regarding the disorder into which public protests regularlydescend has been fed by the diffusion of television footage repeatedly revealing masked



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violent interactions between far-left and anarchist activists, on the one hand, and thepolice and the far-Right, on the other, have been key to the escalation of the cycle ofviolence post-2000.59 As with the previous generation of violent far-left and anarchistgroups, recurrent university student protests appear to have played a formative role in

this regard, by providing opportunities for the accumulation of experiences of violentencounters with the police for a new generation.60 In addition, recent years have seenan increase of law enforcement measures that have been deployed against far-left andanarchist targets, including detentions, raids, and arrests of those participating innon-violent gatherings, from book launches to social clubs, as well as the introductionand broadening of repressive state policies, from punitive sanctions against thosewearing hoodies, to prosecuting universities hosting the Greek branch of the inde-pendent media network Indymedia and, after political demonstrations have turnedviolent, to the random charging of lone juveniles with membership of forming acriminal organization.61

More generally, another important source of resentment and radicalization hasbeen the disproportionate use of violence by front-line police officers, combined withthe weakness of actions on the part of the administrative and political arms of thestate to prevent or punish such violence.62 There are at least two police squads whosecultures of violence have made them the subject of public concern. Firstly, the armedriot police (the MAT), which are an ubiquitous and primary form of police presenceat public demonstrations. They have repeatedly been recorded showing little restraintin their use of tear gas and clubbing (and, over latter years, stun grenades), even onoccasions when those protesting have been the elderly, the blind, or striking police-men.63 Secondly, the Special Guardsestablished in 1999 to guard priority sitesbut who have since acquired normal policing dutieswho are also armed. The

majority of Special Guards are former Special Forces officers of the Greek military,and are given 46 months training before taking on police duties.64 Their style ofpolicing has been criticised for its aggressiveness, particularly after a Special Guardshot dead a fifteen-year-old boy in Exarchia, a bohemian district of Athens, in 2008.65

Compounding the impact of state coerciveness has been the perceived impunityaccorded to far-right violence, and open collaboration between far-right activistsand the police in violent engagements. The number of organized and spontaneousattacks against immigrant, far-left, and anarchist targets by groups of far-rightactivists appears to have climbed over the 2000s.66 By 2009, far-right mobilizationsagainst immigrants in central Athens by platoon-like formations of around thirtyto forty black-clad and capped individuals, armed with sticks, were regularly beingreported in the media.67 These acquired greater public recognition in 2010, when theirpatrols became routine in the Athenian district of Agios Panteleimonas, a place ofhigh tension between immigrant and Greek residents.68 The visibility of far-rightviolence reached a new level on May 12, 2011, with the daylight chasing and beatingof immigrants by an estimated crowd of five hundred far-right extremists in centralAthens (thought to include members of Chrysi Avgi, known as Chrysavgites), thereported injury of nineteen immigrants and six Greeks, and damage to the shops ofimmigrants.69

Furthermore, images of uniformed far-Rightists (suspected Chrysavgites) emerg-ing from, or alongside, police ranks, armed with Molotov cocktails, batons, and

knives, to attack anarchists and far-Leftists during demonstrations and riots, andeven caught on film returning for protection behind those lines, has persuaded manyof the existence of a close cooperative relationship between the far-Right and the



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police over recent years.70 One such illustration was provided on May 9, 2009, whendozens of far-right activists (again, suspected Chrysavgites) passed by police lines toattack Asian refugees housed in Omonia, central Athens, armed with shields, sticks,and grenades, leading to the injury of five immigrants. Cooperation between far-right

activists and elements of the police became so blatant that in October 2009, theincoming PASOK Minister of Citizen Protection, Michalis Chrysochoidis, publiclyacknowledged the existence of the relationship, whilst vowing to seek an end to itand drawing attention to his efforts to see Chrysi Avgi outlawed.71

All this has emerged, however, during a period in which far-right sentiments havebeen gaining broader public support, and a context in which the scapegoating ofimmigrants has offered a convenient diversion for the two largest political partiesfrom concerns about the countrys financial crisis, unemployment, and multiplegrand corruption scandals.72 The differentiated performance and treatment of far-leftand far-right violence has been telling in this regard; the fact, for example, thatfar-right activists have often made no effort to hide their faces during mobilizations,in contrast to the helmeted police and either helmeted or otherwise masked far-Leftists and anarchists.73

The New Generation

Some of the politically symbolic organized attacks to have taken place over the pastdecade, for which far-Leftists or anarchists have been the suspected perpetrators,have gone unclaimed by any organization or individual, including two lethal attacks.The first involved the shooting of a policeman on guard at the residence of the BritishMilitary Attache on December 31, 2004, and the second involved the premature

explosion of a bomb which had the apparently unintended consequence of killing afifteen-year-old Afghan boy and injuring his sister and mother.74 One letter-bombattack, which killed the Head of Security at the Greek Ministry for Citizen Protection(formerly named the Ministry of Public Order) on June 24, 2009, was claimed by anunnamed organization which stated in its public proclamation of July 10, 2010, that itwould announce its name on a later occasion.75 Attacks of unclear origin have alsoencompassed those involving a far lesser level of threat, such as the bombing ofa McDonalds restaurant in Athens just after 4:30 a.m. on July 3, 2009, for whichwarning calls were made.76

As regards violent mobilization by covert far-left and anarchist organizations, anumber of groups emerged to commit a few acts over the 2000s, and quietly ceasedoperations soon after. It has been suggested that, amongst them, approximately tenorganizations proved more durable.77 A small number of groups reached particularprominence due to the frequency or seriousness of their attacks: EpanastatikosAgonas (Revolutionary Struggle), Synomosia ton Pirynon tis Fotias (SPF, orConspiracy of Fire Nuclei, also translated as Conspiracy of Cells of Fire), SehtaEpanastaton(Sect of Revolutionaries or Rebel Sect) and, to a lesser extent, theOrganosi Prostasias Laikou Agona(Organization for the Protection of the PopularStruggle). Below, a synopsis of some of the most important attacks and character-istics of these groups are presented. Of these groups, only Sehta Epanastaton hasclaimed responsibility for lethal attacks. There is little certainty, moreover, as to

whether smaller, short-lived groups were absorbed by larger, more permanent orga-nizations, or whether they were fronts for those seeking to cultivate the impression ofa far more populous and diverse violent landscape. Law enforcement officers have

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speculated as to possible connections between the most prominent groups, arguingthat there may be significant communication between them, or that they may evenbe branches of a single organization.78 In late 2010, for example, the Greek policesuggested that two of the most active groups (Synomosia ton Pirynon tis Fotias and

Sehta Epanastaton) may have been led by the same individual.79

In October 2003, Epanastatikos Agonas was the first of the new generation toemerge, announcing its presence with the bombing of a courthouse complex in Athensthat injured one policeman. The group subsequently carried out attacks againstpolice, ministries, banks and, on one occasion, the petroleum firm Shell.80 One ofits most prominent and audacious attacks, footage of which made international news,was a fire rocket that hit the U.S. Embassy in Athens just before dawn on January 12,2007. Throughout 20072008, the group set off a number of low-level improvisedincendiary devices, but increased the menace of its actions in late 2008, when it useda Kalashnikov to spray gunfire at a bus carrying riot police on December 23. The factthat no one was injured in the attack provoked cynical commentary from a convictedmember of 17N, who suggested that only someone trained by the state could havebeen behind the incident.81 Epanastatikos Agonas then claimed responsibility forthe shooting of policemen on duty outside the Greek Ministry of Culture on January5, 2009, which left one victim critically injured.

In February and March 2009, the group also placed two bombs at Citibankbranches in Athens, one of which was so large that it could have levelled the buildinghad it exploded. Authorities claimed they had not received warning in advance, butthe group claimed it had tried to pass on a warning via a newspaper.82 In a manifesto,the group proclaimed its actions to be a response to the impunity of police violence,stating that attacks would continue if the Public Order Ministry were not to cease

protecting rich thieves, criminal ministers and state officials.83

In this and otherproclamations, the group set out its position as a far-left revolutionary organization,opposing capitalism, U.S. hegemony, and exploitative elites.84 Whilst expressing alack of sympathy for the middle classes who support a rapacious system for theirown capitalist-defined ends, the group has voiced the belief that their actions and con-victions have been grounded in solidarity with the grass-roots struggles of Greeks.There have thus been some similarities between Epanastatikos Agonas and 17N withregard to their proclaimed ideological bases, tactics, and targets. Yet EpanastatikosAgonas has rebutted comparisons to 17N and emphasized that it takes precautionsto avoid committing violence against bystanders.85

Nevertheless, police suspicions concerning those responsible for an attack in 2010illustrated the reputation that had been gained by Epanastatikos Agonas as thecountrys most militant violent group, since it was this group that was suspectedof planting the parcel bomb which killed the Head of Security at the Greek CitizenProtection Ministry, although, as noted above, responsibility was later claimed byan unnamed organization.86 Following a shoot-out on March 21, 2010, which leftone suspect dead, the police announced the discovery of the groups suspected hideoutin April 2010, which also brought to light a sub-machine gun that had been stolenduring a bank robbery in Thessaloniki in 2004. Following six arrests that were madeshortly thereafter, the group was considered to have been dismantled.87 Three of thesuspects accepted responsibility for a range of shootings and bombings that had taken

place since 2003, but denied connection to any lethal attacks. One, Nikos Maziotis,had first been detained and then imprisoned as a conscientious objector in 1991and 1993, respectively, during which time he undertook a hunger strike and received



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the support of Amnesty International.88 He later served 3 years in prison for anattempted bombing in 1997, and had been the subject of surveillance by the Greekintelligence service for a number of years (the reported cessation of his surveillancein 2008 subsequently becoming the subject of critical commentaries after his re-arrest

in 2010).89

In mid-May 2011, after almost a year in custody, still awaiting trial, andhaving posted 43,000 bail payments, three of the suspects who had denied involve-ment in the group were granted conditional release, with restrictions placed on theirfreedom of movement.90 In October 2011, having completed the maximum 18 monthsof detainment in custody and shortly before the commencement of their trial, theremaining three suspects were released, also with restrictions placed on their freedomof movement.91

Synomosia ton Pirynon tis Fotias was the second of the significant groups toemerge over the 2000s, which announced its presence with a range of gas canisterattacks against car dealerships, banks, and the Public Power Company (DEI) inAthens and Thessaloniki, over the space of half an hour at midnight on January 21,2008. Its actions were declared to be in support of the imprisoned anarchist VangelisVoutsatzis. The group has committed numerous acts of arson, including, unusually,daytime strikes. In May 2009, the group used home-made explosives to strike attwo police stations in Athens, and issued a proclamation deliberating on revolution-ary terrorism, in a rare example of self-designating the term. In June 2009, the groupclaimed joint responsibility with a lesser-known group (with whom they then contin-ued to cooperate), Fraxia Mideniston (Nihilist Faction), for a home-made time-bomb placed outside the home of a former Minister of Public Order. On December27, 2009, Synomosia ton Pirynon tis Fotias, in co-operation with a newly emergedAndartiki Omada Terroriston (Guerilla Team of Terrorists), used a four-member

unit to plant a bomb that destroyed the entrance to a prominent building on SyngrouAvenue (one of the central thoroughfares of Athens), preceding the attack with awarning call to newspapers. Synomosia ton Pirynon tis Fotias also claimed responsi-bility for a bomb which exploded outside the Greek Parliament on January 9, 2010.92

Following the fire-bombing of a Marfin Bank branch in Athens during demonstra-tions held on May 5, 2010, against the IMF and national austerity measures, whichcaused the deaths of three people, the group issued a statement accounting, but notclaiming responsibility, for the incident.

The organization has described itself as an urban guerilla group and has issuedstatements railing against consumer society and its ills. It has also rejected the notionthat its acts of urban warfare are, or should be, a means to an end, claiming ratherthat they are an end in themselves. On several occasions, it has also voiced supportnot only for anarchist prisoners but also for an imprisoned member of 17N.93 Someanarchists and Leftists have responded skeptically to the apparent honoring of afar-Leftist by an anarchist group, given that many anarchists are opposed in principleto the authoritarianism inherent to the use of violence. Nevertheless, it is by no meansthe first time that Greek anarchists appear to have mobilized in support of 17N.94

Following raids on apartments in the suburbs of Athens in autumn 2009, Greekpolice arrested four suspected members of Synomosia ton Pirynon tis Fotias (and, inearly 2010, a further individual who had previously been arrested at demonstrationsduring the European Social Forum in Athens in 2006). On October 5, 2010, the

organization responded with a series of bombings across Athens and a statementboth vowing revenge and denying that those arrested had any connection with thegroup.95 The attacks did continue; in March 2010, Synomosia ton Pirynon tis Fotias

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claimed responsibility for a succession of bombings at a police immigrant detentioncentre, the home of a Pakistani Community Leader, and at offices of Chrysi Avgi. 96

A few months later, the group issued the text addressing the aforementioned lethalfirebombing incident of May 2010.97

In November 2010, small packages of explosives were sent to a dozen foreign tar-gets in Greece and abroad. Given that the event occurred only a few days before localelections at which a budget-slashing Greek government had threatened to stake itsposition, much hyperbolic public debate ensued. A number of prominent politicians,terrorism experts, and media commentators voiced defiance towards the episodewhich they claimed threatened, but would fail, to destabilize Greek democracy andsociety.98 To the dismay of some, the general public appeared to be little perturbedby the whole affair.99 This was not altogether surprising, since the packages were soonintercepted by police after an employee of a courier company received a minor burnfrom one. In a demonstration of unparalleled efficiency, two men carrying guns andtwo parcel bombs were immediately apprehended by police nearby.100 The men main-tained a silence after their arrest but were confirmed as members of the group, alongwith another arrested suspect, by a proclamation purportedly from Synomosia tonPirynon tis Fotias published several weeks later, in which the group claimed responsi-bility for the series of parcel bombs.101 The trial of a total of nine suspects accused ofmembership of the group began in January 2011. In July 2011, the court unanimouslyconvicted six of the defendants, handing down what were viewed by some as heavysentences (heavier, indeed, than had been requested by the prosecuting authorities)for relatively innocuous acts.102 Two of those convicted received prison sentencesof 25 years each, one a sentence of 20 years, three others sentences of 11 years each,and one a sentence of just under three years.103 By late 2011, however, investigations

carried out under the instruction of the Court of Appeal found that witnesses couldnot identify the four accused of delivering the parcel bombs to the courier companyand could support an alibi that had been provided by one of the four.104

The third of the major groups of the new generation, Sehta Epanastaton,emerged in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of a fifteen-year-old in December2008, an event which ignited a month of nationwide social unrest. Police have specu-lated that the group was formed by disgruntled members of Epanastatikos Agonas.105

The first appearance of the group was an attack in which grenades were thrown and asub-machine gun was fired at a police station in Athens on February 3, 2009. It thenissued a proclamation, left on the grave of the teenager, threatening violence againstthe police and prominent figures of the Greek establishmentfrom journalists tomedia stars, and from businessmen to public officials and politicianswhilst claimingresponsibility for the police station attack.106 On February 17, 2009, the group firedshots and threw an explosive device (which failed to detonate) at Alter, a leading priv-ate television station. In June 2009, the group shot and killed a policeman guarding thehouse of the key state witness in the ELA case during the period in which the appeal ofsuspected members was being heard in court.107 Police later announced that cartridgecasings from the scene were identified as having been emitted from a weapon alreadyused by that organization.108 The logic of the target was not self-evident, especiallysince the weakness of testimony supplied by the witness in question was alreadywell-known and duly ensured the success of the appeal within the ensuing six months.

The following year, on July 19, they carried out a second and even more unusuallethal attack, on the investigative journalist Sokratis Giolias. In this attack, they againused weapons which the police were able to match with their previous attacks, and a



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week after the event also provided a document in which they claimed responsibilityand provided photographic evidence of their weapons cache.109 In terms of its ideo-logical leanings, Sehta Epanastaton has espoused anti-capitalist anarchist principles,voicing criticisms of consumerism, as well as elitist structures of governance and their

supporters amongst the middle classes. Nevertheless, its public statements haverepeated a preference for targeted lethal violence (and the group has thus beendisavowed by many anarchists), a lack of empathy for all those not committed torevolution, and a rejection of structuralist analysis of the economic system (therebydistantiating themselves from far-left groups).110

Finally, the Organosi Prostasias Laikou Agona, named after a notorious Stalinistmilitia active under the German occupation and civil war periods (mid- and late1940s), struck on October 27, 2009: two men on motorbike opened fire with an assaultrifle on policemen standing outside a local police station in Athens. Five of the police-men were injured, two seriously. The old-fashioned Stalinism of the proclamationsubsequently sent to the media raised considerable skepticism amongst the policeas to its authenticity, and the KKE scorned the text as a spoof pastiche whilst voicingconcerns that it could be the work ofagents provocateurs.111

Expert, Political, and Media Views on the Evolution of Political Violence

As suggested in the introduction, expert, political, and media commentaries on con-temporary political violence in Greece have focused their attention on what has beenregarded as the novel features of the new generation of violent covert far-left andanarchist groups, as well as on the factors that are believed to have characterized thesuccesses and failures of intelligence and law enforcement engaged in their suppression.

Numerous accounts of violence perpetrated by covert far-left and anarchistgroups over recent years have pointed to superficial qualities of their purportedmotives, often as qualities which distinguish them from their predecessors. Sugges-tions have been made, for example, that actions have been carried out by entirelyinsincere agents provocateurs working for actors with very different political objec-tives than those stated in the published proclamations of the groups.112 Alternatively,it has been proposed that violent actions have amounted to a method of social signal-ing amongst colleagues, and have thus been perpetrated with the primary aim of eitherdemonstrating support for, or consolidating support from, similarly-committedindividuals and groups (whether domestically or internationally).113 Others havecontended that the published proclamations of covert groups have revealed the latterto be unsophisticated actors lacking serious ideological arguments, who are ideo-logically vacuous or have no ideological approach, and are willing to engage insenseless violence with no interest in attracting popular support, explaining theiractions, or providing any realistic vision of a political alternative.114

To some extent, these interpretations have mirrored those critical of the socialunrest of December 2008 (whose participants were also accused of mindless violence),although accounts of the unrest have been far more varied than those of covert groupsoperating since the 2000s.115 As regards the unrest, for example, numerous accountsdrew attention to the influence of a legacy of radical politics, alongside the grievancesof a youth shaped by the predicament of being overeducated, underemployed, and

exploited, the frustrations generated by a broader conjunction of systemic failuresacross Greek social, economic, and political life, and the problems associated withthe organized representation of far-left positions within the parliamentary political

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system.116 As with violence carried out by covert far-left and anarchist groups,questions have been raised about the psychological make-up of those participatingin the unrest of December 2008, with suggestions that violence was perpetrated bythose variously portrayed as apolitical, bored, and possibly drug-induced, middle-

class youths, who selfishly attacked the property of those less fortunate; the workersthemselves.117 Whereas this has meant that the character of the violence of December2008 was, for some observers, purely criminal, in the case of covert groups it hasmeant that they have been argued to be more appropriately defined as organizedcriminal associations, rather than as terrorists or as groups engaged in politicalcrime.118 Indeed, this point has been underscored by the suggestion that anarchistsand far-left groups of the new generation forged novel bonds of cooperation withcriminals (including during the imprisonment of both).119

In turn, the above interpretations have influenced assessments of the actions ofthe new generation. Thus, it has been proposed that an environment of unpre-cedented danger and brutality has been cultivated by the most recent generationof violent political groups, who have no qualms about attacking everywhere andwhenever without hesitation as to the number and identity of their victims.120 Therehave even been comparisons made between their violence with that perpetrated byviolent sub-state groups in Iraq and Afghanistan, with the suggestion that the newgeneration has heralded the spectre of mass, indiscriminate killings in Greece, andeven that Greece has acquired an international reputation equal to that of Yemenfor exporting terrorism.121 The justifications made for such assessments have beenweak, however, citing the shootings of police, the large-scale bomb placed atCitibank (which did not explode), the bomb attack on a McDonalds restaurant thatwas closed for the evening (and for which a warning was confirmed to have been

called in), and the series of letter bombs that caused only one minor injury andminimal damage.122

Moreover, the most recent generation of covert far-left and anarchist groups haveclearly drawn on a repertoire of acts associated with the previous generation, fromissuing public proclamations to conducting a wide range of similar types of attacks,against similar types of targets. The killing committed by Sehta Epanastaton of thewitness in the ELA trial, for example, was strongly reminiscent of the tactics usedby 17N: gunmen on motorcycles striking targets in vehicles that were followingroutine schedules. The targets of the new generation have also remained close tothose of the previous generation; from banks, to security installations, to politiciansand foreign diplomats, the police, and firms with an international identity, and alsooccasionally, those less-discriminate.123

Equally, groups of the new generation have been portrayed as a greater threatbecause of their alleged organizational affiliations with international criminal net-works and transnational associations of activists.124 Police sources have suggestedthat the latter generation have used criminal gangs to supply them with weaponry,that they have committed robberies and are connected to bank robbers, and havebeen enhanced at crucial periods of activity with expertise and assistance from foreigncounterparts. Again, there has been a tendency from certain quarters to entertainmore messianic hypotheses, such as those involving connections to violent Islamicextremism. One strand of argument running through some public commentaries

has warned, for instance, of an impending domestic rise of Islamic terrorism emergingfrom the growing numbers of Muslims living in Greece since the 1990s, and possiblycollaborating with Greek groups engaged in political violence.125 Allegations were



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structure were revealed, commentators could also point to the difficulties inherent touncovering such a secretive, small, and tight-knit group of terrorists, even if the samefeatures ultimately led to its swift unraveling.132 Additionally, the thesis of eliteresponsibility was refreshed, if this time with a positive emphasis; PASOK Minister

of Public Order, Michalis Chrysochoidis, was credited with instigating meaningfulco-operation between Greek law enforcement agencies and their British andU.S. counterparts, thereby facilitating a substantial upgrading and re-organizing ofGreek counter-terror efforts in the years immediately preceding the arrests.133

Nevertheless, dissenting voices have questioned the extent to which the captureof suspected members of first-generation groups truly demonstrated either thedismantling of these organizations or the enhanced effectiveness of Greek counter-terrorism policy. A day following the publication of photos of arrested suspectedmembers of 17N in July 2002, for example, a proclamation apparently authoredby elusive members of 17N was sent to the media, which defended the record of17N and asserted its continued existence and operational capabilities.134 Some(including the lawyer for the prosecution, Alexandros Lycourezos) suggested thatnot all, or even only relatively unimportant, members of 17N had been arrestedand that other members might be involved in the generation of groups operatingsubsequently.135 These criticisms proved persuasive; the file on 17N was reopenedin the winter of 2009 in order to search for up to a dozen further members thoughtto be at large.136

As regards ELA, not only did prosecutions ultimately end in failure for the state(as noted above), but in 1996, only one year after ELA had officially ceased to exist, anew organization emerged under the name Epanastatikoi Pyrines (RevolutionaryNuclei) which, due to similarities in its operations and the language of its proclama-

tions, was believed to have been formed by a number of past members of ELA.Alongside 17N, Epanastatikoi Pyrines carried out dozens of low-level bombings ofsymbolic targets with improvised devices over the late 1990s (its last confirmed attacktaking place in 2000). Finally, despite the expectations of the Greek authorities inearly 2010 that they had identified almost all of the members of the major covertfar-left and anarchist groups operating by the late 2000s, and that they would be ableto dismantle all by mid-2010, as of September 2011, no arrests had yet taken place ofsuspected members of the most lethal group, Sehta Epanastaton.137 Recognition ofan apparent pattern of omissions and weaknesses has underpinned negative assess-ments of the states capacities to put an end to political violence perpetrated by covertfar-left and anarchist groups. Reminiscent of the argument that the arrests of 17Nsuspects owed more to an accident that befell a group member than to the newcompetency of the Greek police counter-terror division, several commentators havepointed to the importance of luck and chance encounters in providingmore recent police successes, and the approach of the state has once more beendisparaged from some quarters as apparently lethargic [ . . . ] if not indifferent.138

Whilst these perspectives have challenged the romanticism of dominant accountsof state interventions against political violence, appreciation of other macro-levelfactors that have shaped the emergent cycle of violence, such as the dynamics of inter-actions between different groups and state authorities, have remained minimal. Fol-lowing official records, commentaries have commonly neglected the role of far-right

actions from examinations of political violence in Greece, which has ensured that animportant part of the picture has often been left out of the frame of analysis.139 TheGreek state has long failed to collect data on racist violence or racially-motivated



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crimes. Indeed, for a full thirty years, not a single published legal judgment appliedLaw 972=1979, which provides for the punishment of acts or conducts aimed atracial discrimination, with the first known application of the law in criminal courtstaking place in 2010.140 Nevertheless, media and non-governmental bodies have

increasingly recorded and highlighted such violence.Rather, then, than being hindered by a lack of reporting, one possible expla-

nation for the neglect of far-right violence by commentaries on the development ofpolitical violence since the 2000s may be because its targetsunlike those of far-leftand anarchist groupshave tended not to include state representatives or institu-tions, and have more typically targeted immigrants as well as those of the far-Leftand anarchists. In fact, for those who consider the state to have neglected its respon-sibilities in policing immigrants and providing Greeks with the protection fromimmigrants that they believe they need, it is especially in the act of targeting immi-grants that far-right violence may be interpreted as supportive of the state. Indeed,such interpretations have been referenced in assessments of sympathetic localresponses to the regular deployment of uniformed and club-wielding far-rightplatoons that intimidate and attack immigrants in the Agios Panteleimonas districtof Athens.141

Conclusion: Macro-Level Analysis and Policy Implications

In considering the applicability of Della Portas tripartite analytical framework tothe case of groups engaged in covert political violence in Greece since the mid-1970s,two complications become apparent. The first is that the lifecycles of violent groupshave overlapped, rather than succeeded each other.142 The second and related com-

plication is the possibility that there has been an overlap in the membership ofgroups from different generations. Notwithstanding these caveats, macro-level fac-tors appear as vital to explaining the emergence of organized political violence inGreece as they have proved to explaining the emergence of the phenomenon else-where in Europe. As cautioned by Della Porta, cycles of political violence cannotbe directly attributed either to the extensiveness of radical ideological predispositionswithin a society, or to the breadth of the legitimacy gap experienced by the state inpublic opinion. Important macro-level stimuli of a cycle of violence do include,however, a parliamentary political system that fails to sufficiently address theconcerns of radicals, that relies excessively on the deployment of state coercion,and that appears to condone far-right violence.

Moreover, in terms of the role played by the socio-economic environment, bothcontemporary and longer-term trends are key conditioning factors. As regardslonger-term trends, there are ramifications for the Greek case stemming from recentresearch which has found a significant relationship between national social welfaresystems and experiences of homegrown far-left covert groups engaged in violencein Western Europe.143 The research found not only that higher social spending is con-sistently associated with lower levels of such violence, but also that particular forms ofwelfare spending may affect the propensity of a society to experience such violence.More specifically, societies whose welfare spending targeted the youth environmentby generating better opportunities over a raft of pertinent areas (such as healthcare

and active labor market programs) were effective in lowering the risk of politicalviolence, whilst spending on programs that did not directly affect youth populations(e.g., universal, housing, and family benefits) was less effective. More broadly, whilst

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welfare regimes that succeeded in fostering greater social equality were less vulnerableto experiencing political violence, higher levels of de-commodification were evenmore important to reducing vulnerability.

These are highly pertinent findings for a country such as Greece, in which levels

of poverty and inequality have, since the mid-1980s, stubbornly remained amongstthe highest in the EU, and whose relatively low levels of welfare provision have alwaysbeen concentrated in spending on pensions. The structure of welfare provision inGreece was designed to facilitate social stability through the successive clientelisticco-option of sectoral interests, and has disproportionately benefitted those withmiddle-class incomes more than effectively reduce poverty (social transfers in Greecehave had far less impact in reducing poverty than similarly-targeted transfers by otherEU member-states).144 This strategy has clearly come at a cost. There has been a con-sistent neglect of the young, with active labor market programs practically nonexist-ent, levels of investment in research and development activities by the Greek stateamongst the lowest in the EU-27, and youth unemployment amongst the highest ofthe EU-27. There is a burgeoning problem as an increasingly educated youth popu-lation faces a small, unsuitable, and unappealing job market, rising strains on familialmechanisms of support, an intensifying materialist culture, and witnesses ever-mounting examples of impunity towards grand corruption and clientelism alike.145

Given the crisis in the finances of the Greek state, it is unclear how, if at all,problems relating to welfare provision and job creation will be managed. Equally,it is evident that problems associated with the inadequacies of radical representationwithin the formal political system will be exacerbated if the contingent of anarchistsand far-Leftists who feel unable to support parliamentary politics continues toincrease, and, at the same time, far-right opinion steadily gains greater ground within

the parliamentary system.Despite the growth of international interest in the subject of political violence in

Greece over recent years, there has been little attempt to provide a theoretical frame-work for understanding its repeated resurgence or to go beyond narrowly-definedanalyses of the trajectories of individual group members, group features, and stateresponses. As this article has sought to show, the study of political violence in Greecerequires a far broader analytical approach if questions about the resurgence andescalation of political violence are to be comprehensively answered. Identifying thefactors that generate cycles of violence also carries important policy implicationsfor the Greek state. Whilst the reasons for radicalization and violence are being exa-cerbated rather than positively addressed, the efficiency and effectiveness of channel-ing greater investment of resources and hopes into intelligence and law-enforcementstrategies can only be doubted.

Notes

1. The application of far-leftist or anarchist appellations to covert groups andinstances of political violence in contemporary Greece is not without its controversies andpitfalls. For the purposes of shorthand, however, and in addition to evidence of certain basiccharacteristics of far-leftist and anarchist thought (radical anti-capitalist and anti-state senti-ments in particular) which such groups appear to promotenot least since these are ideologi-cal markers with which, on occasion, they have self-identifiedthese broad labels are also

used in this paper. A rich archive of proclamations from a variety of radical groups operatingin Greece between 1975 and 2010 has been gathered by former U.S. Foreign Service OfficerJohn Brady Kiesling and made publicly available at https:==docs.google.com=leaf?id0Bxsw



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DOCtp5r2ZWE0 Mjc4OWUtMGY3Mi00YmMyLWEzZDctNDA3MzBlODI0NThm&sortname&layoutlist&num50 (accessed 17 May 2011).

2. To offer some regional contextualization, according to the Global Terrorism Data-base, Greece experienced over half the number of terrorist incidents as Italy between 1970and 2008 (893 and 1494 incidents, respectively), whilst Germany experienced less than half the

number of those which took place in Italy (554). The peak numbers of incidents recorded inGreece have never gone above one hundred (usually hovering between the upper 40s and lower60s), in contrast to recorded peaks of incidents in Italy and Germany. See further the GlobalTerrorism Database, START, available at http://www.start.umd.edu/gtd/ (accessed 7 May2011); EUROPOL,EU Terrorism Situation and Trend Report TE-SAT(The Hague: EuropeanPolice Office, 2007-2011), available at http://www.europol.europa.eu/index.asp?page=publications (accessed 17 May 2011).

3. See, e.g., George Karyotis, The Securitisation of Greek Terrorism and the Arrest ofthe Revolutionary Organization November 17, Cooperation and Conflict 42, no. 3 (2007):271293; Christos Kollias, Petros Messis, Nikolaos Mylonidis, and Suzanna-Maria Paleolo-gou, Terrorism and the Effectiveness of Security Spending in Greece: Policy Implicationsand Some Empirical Findings, Journal of Policy Modeling 31 (2009): 802-788; ChristosFloros and Bruce Newsome, Building Counter-Terrorism Capacity Across Borders: Lessonsfrom the Defeat of Revolutionary Organization 17N, Journal of Security Sector Manage-ment 6, no. 2 (July 2008): 114.

4. George Kassimeris, For a Place in History: Explaining Greeces RevolutionaryOrganization 17 November,Journal of Conflict Studies 27, no. 2 (2007): 129145.

5. See respectively, Athanasios G. Konstandopoulos and Theodore Modis, UrbanGuerrilla Activities in Greece, Technological Forecasting and Social Change 72, no. 1(2005): 4958 at 57; George Kassimeris, Last Act in a Violent Drama? The Trial of GreecesRevolutionary Organization 17 November, Terrorism and Political Violence18, no. 1 (2006):137157 at 154.

6. A recent exception, offering a largely descriptive account of the new group Revol-utionary Struggle, is George Kassimeris, Greeces New Generation of Terrorists: TheRevolutionary Struggle, Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 34, no. 3 (2011): 199211.

7. For explanatory accounts of political violence in Greece between 1974 and 2003, seeindicatively: Daphne Biliouri and Tamara Makarenko, Is This The End of 17N?, JanesIntelligence Review 14, no. 9 (2002): 610; Alexis Papahelas and Tassos Telloglou, File on 17November [in Greek] (Athens: Hestia, 2002); Konstandopoulos and Modis (see note 5 above);P. A. Krythimou, Greek Justice Unmasked: The Painful Experiences of the Prosecutor whoDiscovered 17N [in Greek] (Athens: Eleftheri Dikaiosyni, 2005); Karyotis (see note 3 above);George Kassimeris, For a Place in History (see note 4 above); Floros and Newsome (seenote 3 above). However, a broader account of the first generation of politically violent groupsthat addresses their trajectory until 2001 has been provided by George Kassimeris, Last RedTerrorists: The Revolutionary Organization 17 November(London: Hurst, 2001). See also JohnBrady Kiesling, Explosions in Athens: Violent Greek Politics, 19692011 (unpublished manu-script, 2011).

8. Donatella Della Porta,Social Movements, Political Violence, and the State: A Com-

parative Analysis of Italy and Germany (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).9. Konstandopoulos and Modis (see note 5 above); Kassimeris, Last Red Terrorists

(see note 7 above).10. On the Italian case, see Della Porta (see note 8 above), 193194.11. It was not until 1989, for example, that the Greek government finally took steps

to destroy 16.5 million intelligence files that had been compiled by the Greek police andintelligence services since 1944 on the political and private sentiments of Greek citizens. Yet thisconstituted destruction of less than half of all the (41.2 million) police files that had been createdsince 1981: Minas Samatas,Surveillance in Greece: From Anticommunist to Consumer Surveil-lance (New York: Pella, 2004), 64. See further Leonidas K. Cheliotis and Sappho Xenakis,Whats Neoliberalism Got to Do With It? Towards a Political Economy of Punishment inGreece,Criminology & Criminal Justice 10, no. 4 (2010): 353373.

12. See further Sappho Xenakis, Organized Crime and Political Violence, in LeonidasK. Cheliotis and Sappho Xenakis (eds.), Crime and Punishment in Contemporary Greece: Inter-national Comparative Perspectives (Oxford: Peter Lang AG, 2011), 241287.

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13. See further Papahelas and Telloglou (see note 7 above), 45; Konstantinos Ifantis,From Factionalism to Autocracy: PASOKs De-Radicalisation during the Regime Transitionof the 1970s, in Richard Gillespie, Michael Waller, and Lourdes Lopez Nieto (eds.),FactionalPolitics and Democratization(Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 1995), 7789.

14. On the weakness of post-dictatorship lustration actions in Greece, see Neovi M.

Karakatsanis, The Politics of Elite Transformation: The Consolidation of Greek Democracyin Theoretical Perspective(Westport, CT: Praeger, 2001). On the Italian case, see Della Porta(see note 8 above), 192194.

15. Kassimeris,Last Red Terrorists(see note 7 above), 56; Robert McDonald,Pillar andTinderbox: The Greek Press and the Dictatorship (New York & London: Marion Boyars,1983), 187188.

16. Stamos Zoulas, Terror Unfettered as No One Took Charge, Kathimerini, 26August 2002.

17. The Black Bible of Chrysi Avgi [in Greek],Eleftherotypia, 2 July 1998; SeraphimSeferiades, Polarisation and Nonproportionality: The Greek Party System in the PostwarEra, Comparative Politics 19, no. 1 (1986): 6995; see further Xenakis, Organized Crimeand Political Violence (see note 12 above); Vassilis Nedos, Greek Right: The Rotten Eggof the Snake [in Greek], To Vima, 11 September 2005. In addition to its far-right ideology,examples of use by Chrysi Avgi of imagery and practices redolent of fascist and Nazi influences(such as the flag design and roman salute; see further the organizations website at http://xryshaygh.wordpress.com/) have meant the party is also commonly characterised asneo-fascist.

18. This allegation was supported by the publication of what appeared to be a copy ofthe Intelligence Agencys official salary records, reproduced in Charis J. Kousoumvris, Demol-ishing the Myth of Chrysi Avgi[in Greek] (Piraeus: Erevos, 2004), 9. The document in questionwas denounced as a forgery by Chrysi Avgi, whose website has cited the decision (no. 52803=04) of an Athenian Court of the First Instance in May 2004 to convict an individual relatedto the far-right party LAOS for defamation and repeated use of a forged document whichwas the basis for the allegation. Chrysi Avgi has retained a reputation for intimidation andviolence and by 2011 constituted the largest of the extra-parliamentary far-right groups.

Following local elections in November 2010, where the party attracted 5.5% of the vote,Michaloliakos took up a seat on the Athens City Council (see Muslims Mark Eid with Out-door Prayers: Tension Ensues, Athens News, 16 November 2010). Attempts were repeatedlymade by the far-right parliamentary party LAOS to include Chrysi Avgi members as candi-dates for municipal or national office but these efforts were abandoned due to negative polit-ical and press reactions; see, e.g., Dancing with Greeces Extreme Right, Kathimerini, 17October 2007.

19. See, e.g., The Cache of Karamanlis: The Forgotten Terrorism [in Greek],Elefth-erotypia, 29 September 2002. The centre-right broadsheet newspaperKathimerinihas proposedexactly the opposite thesis, that the rare actions of far-right fringe groups have always over-excited the democratic sensibilities of those in the media who systematically underestimatedthe actions of real terrorists, implying those of the far-left 17N group and its well-documented lethality (Zoulas, see note 16 above). As elaborated further below, however, there

is considerable consensus of the existence of official and scholarly lacunae on the subjectof violence perpetrated by the far-Right and the underreporting of crimes (such as thosemotivated by a racist ideology) in which they are believed to regularly engage.

20. See further Kassimeris, Last Red Terrorists (see note 7 above).21. See, e.g., ibid.; Christos Giovanopoulos and Dimitris Dalakoglou, From Ruptures

to Eruption: A Genealogy of the December 2008 Revolt in Greece, in Antonis Vradis andDimitris Dalakoglou (eds.), Revolt and Crisis in Greece: Between a Present Yet to Pass anda Future Still to Come(London: AK Press=Occupied London, 2011), 91114.

22. See further Kassimeris,Last Red Terrorists(see note 7 above), 5664. See also, indica-tively, the list of parties contesting national elections over the decade of the 2000s, as listed on theelections information website of the Greek Ministry of the Interior at http://ekloges.ypes.gr.

23. On the significant patterns of collective protest (labour strikes, political demonstra-

tions, student strikes, and occupations) in the years after the fall of the dictatorship, seefurther Nikos Serdedakis, Democratisation and Collective Action in Post-Junta Greece(19741981), paper presented at the European Consortium for Political Research General



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Conference, Pisa, 68 September 2007. Available at: http://www.essex.ac.uk/ecpr/events/generalconference/pisa/papers/PP389.pdf (accessed 20 July 2011).

24. Indeed, under the PASOK government surveillance targets were re-characterised asanarchists rather than leftist=communists, although communists in general and theKKE still remained subject to surveillance: Samatas (see note 11 above), 5254. On the swift

move to centrist politics by PASOK, see Ifantis (see note 13 above); Seferiades (see note 17above).

25. Panagiotis Kalamaras, There Were Many People Who Felt We Had an UnfinishedRevolution, in A. G. Schwarz, T. Sagris, and Void Network (eds.), We Are an Image Fromthe Future: The Greek Revolt of December 2008 (Oakland, CA: AK Press, 2010), 1416;Alkis, December is a Result of Social and Political Processes Going Back Many Years,in A. G. Schwarz et al., op. cit., 813, 294299.

26. ELA Architect Behind Bars, Makes Partial Confession, Kathimerini, 5 February2003; ELA Four Get 25 Years, Kathimerini, 12 October 2004.

27. Christos I. Chalazias,The Ideology of Revolutionary Popular Struggle: The Texts [inGreek] (Athens: Ellinika Grammata, 2003).

28. Dora Antoniou, Fighting Revolutionary Popular Struggle, Revolutionary Nuclei,Kathimerini, 4 February 2002.

29. Tassos Telloglou, The Turbulent History of ELA [in Greek], To Vima, 9 February 2003.30. Ioanna Mandrou, Five In, Five Out for ELA 1st May [in Greek],To Vima, 24

August 2003.31. Vassilis Lambropoulos, The Hide-and-Seek between the Hellenic Police and ELA

[in Greek], To Vima, 9 February 2003.32. Kassimeris,Last Red Terrorists (see note 7 above), 100.33. ELA Sentencing Delayed, Kathimerini, 8 October 2004.34. ELA Architect Behind Bars,Kathimerini, 5 February 2003.35. ELA Four Get 25 Years, Kathimerini, 12 October 2004.36. Tsigaridas Describes ELA to Court, Kathimerini, 9 July 2004.37. Prosecutors Call for Kassimis, Serifis to be Freed, 4 Convicts to be Sentenced,

Kathimerini, 8 June 2005; ELA Acquitted, ERA, 1 July 2005.

38. Innocent: The Three Defendants of the ELA Trial [in Greek], Kathimerini, 4December 2009.

39. Kassimeris,Last Red Terrorists (see note 7 above).40. Kassimeris notes that early media reports of the incident speculated that Xiros was a

member of Revolutionary Cells or Popular Resistance, two other minor domestic groupsthat had been active around that time: Kassimeris, Last Act in a Violent Drama? (see note 5above).

41. Dimitris Kastriotis, Heroes and Villains, Kathimerini, 19 July 2002.42. Kassimeris, Last Act in a Violent Drama? (see note 5 above).43. 17N Appeal is Rejected, Kathimerini, 4 May 2007; 17N Sentences Could be

Trimmed, Kathimerini, 8 May 2007; 17N Sentences, Kathimerini, 10 May 2007.44. The appeal was due to be heard in January 2011, and the defendants case was

presented to the court in April 2011 (the appeal process was ongoing as of September

2011): Valia Kaimaki, In January Yiotopoulos Appeal at the European Court [in Greek],Eleftherotypia, 24 November 2010; Valia Kaimaki, Witch Hunt Trial of Yiotopoulos [inGreek], Eleftherotypia, 17 April 2011. A list of these regularities was presented by his lawyerto the Greek Appeals Court in 2007. Katerina Kati and Panagiotis Stathis, What Will YouReply to the European Court? [in Greek], Eleftherotypia, 23 March 2007; see also Kassimeris,For a Place (see note 4 above), 144145.

45. On the unrest of December 2008, see, e.g., Andreas Kalyvas, An Anomaly? SomeReflections on the Greek December 2008, Constellations 17, no. 2 (2010): 351365.

46. See Cheliotis and Xenakis, Whats Neoliberalism Got to Do With It? (see note 11above); Leonidas K. Cheliotis and Sappho Xenakis, Crime, Fear of Crime and Punitive-ness, in Leonidas K. Cheliotis and Sappho Xenakis (eds.), Crime and Punishment in Contem-

porary Greece: International Comparative Perspectives (Oxford: Peter Lang AG, 2011), 143;

Xenakis, Organized Crime and Political Violence (see note 12 above).47. See, e.g., discussion in Antigone Lyberaki and Christos J. Paraskevopoulos,Social Capital Measurement in Greece, paper presented at the OECD-ONS international

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conference on Social Capital Measurement, London, September 2527, 2002, available at:http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/22/15/2381649.pdf (accessed 17 May 2011).

48. See, e.g., Kalyvas (see note 45 above).49. Opinion poll carried out by Kappa Research for the centrist To Vima broadsheet

newspaper: Fear, Anger and Uncertainty [in Greek], To Vima, 31 December 2010.

50. See, e.g., Pericles Korovessiset al.,Political Violence is Always Fascistic: A Collectionof Texts Against Terror [in Greek] (Athens: Diapiron, 2010).

51. See, e.g., footage and accompanying discussion of allegations ofagents provocateursactive during mass protests on 29 June 2011, which took place against the introduction ofharsh financial measures by the government to secure international loans against a back-ground of economic crisis: What Are These Hoodies? [in Greek], Main News 20:00 (at20:5320:55), Alter television. Available via the news portal Real.gr at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-d_qJ77tU0&feature=related (accessed 21 July 2011).

52. See, e.g., comments by convicted 17N member Vassilis Tzortzatos against Revol-utionary Struggle, cited in George Gilson, Terrorists Up the Ante,Athens News, 20 Febru-ary 2009. On past infiltration, see, e.g., comments by former U.S. Foreign Service OfficerBrady Kiesling on the Danos Krystallis case: Danos Krystallis and the Critical Dialoguewith 17N, article on personal website: (accessed 29 November 2010).

53. See, e.g., comments by the former PASOK advisor Mary Bossi: The Expert: TheNext Terrorists Steps Will Be More Dangerous, GR Reporter, 5 November 2010.

54. One was a bomb attack targeting a Pakistani Community leader, another involvedthe lethal mafia-style hit of a journalist known for exposing stories of corruption and sleazeabout leading public figures, and more recent examples were the parcel bombs targeting theChilean and Mexican Embassies (amongst others). See, respectively, Greece: Bomb HitsPakistani Leaders Home in Athens, BBC News, 20 March 2010; Helena Smith, GunmenMurder Greek Investigative Journalist Socratis Giolias, The Guardian, 20 July 2010; HelenaSmith, Greek Letter Bomb Attacks Put Europe on High Alert, The Guardian, 3 November2010; Mark Heinrich and Peter Apps, Bomb Incidents in Greece, Reuters, 2 November 2010.

55. See Sian Sullivan, Viva Nihilism! On Militancy and Machismo in (Anti-)

Globalisation Protest, in Richard Devetak and Christopher W. Hughes (eds.), The Globaliza-tion of Political Violence: Globalizations Shadow (Abingdon: Routledge, 2008), 203243; andSchwarz et al. (see note 25 above).

56. Not all Greek antiauthoritarians self-identify as anarchists, however. See furtherSchwarzet al.(see note 25 above), and contributions from Greek anarchists in the internationalanarchist journal 325, 8 (September 2010), available at (accessed 29 November 2010).

57. For a detailed indicative critical assessment of far-leftist politics in Greece from afar-left perspective, see Tassos Anastassiadis and Andreas Sartzekis, Left Perspectives onthe December Revolt, International Viewpoint 4, 411 (2009). For a more positive readingof a strong relationship between SYRIZA and the grass-roots far-left and anarchist activistsof December 2008, see Loukia Kotronaki and Seraphim Seferiadis, Sur les Sentiers de laColere: LEspace Temps dune Revolt (Athenes, December 2008), Actuel Marx 48 (2010):

152165 at 157. To give an indication of the electoral strength of these parties, the KKEhas seen a modest rise in its share of the vote in national elections from 5.9% in 2004 to7.54% in 2009, whilst Syriza saw its share rise from 3.26% in 2004 to 4.60% in 2009 (for furtherdetails see http://ekloges.ypes.gr).

58. The failure of SYRIZA to make gains in the elections for the European Parliamentin 2009 were commonly blamed on its supportive stance towards the unrest of December 2008;see, e.g., Takis S. Pappas, Winning by Default: The Greek Election of 2009, South EuropeanSociety and Politics15, no. 2 (2010): 273287 at 278; but contrast the far-leftist account offeredin Josephine Iakovidou, Kostas Kanellopoulos, and Loukia Kotronaki, The Greek Uprisingof December 2008,Situations: Project of the Radical Imagination 3, no. 2 (2010): 145157 at156. On the growing membership of anarchist associations in Greece, see, e.g., In Greece,Austerity Kindles Deep Discontent, The Washington Post, 13 May 2011; Schwarz et al.

(see note 25 above), 342.59. See, e.g., Kostas Kyriakopoulos and Aris Chatzigeorgiou, Anarchists in theTrenches and Flowerboxes [in Greek], Eleftherotypia, 20 January 2007.



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60. See Schwarzet al. (see note 25); Giovanopoulos and Dalakoglou, From Rupturesto Eruption (see note 21).

61. See, e.g., New Protest March for Exarchia [in Greek],Eleftherotypia, 12 November2009; Spree of Anarchist Violence in Centre, Kathimerini, 23 October 2009; Bill ImposesStrict Penalties for Vandals Wearing Hoods,Kathimerini, 24 April 2009; Hoodies Law is

to be Scrapped, Kathimerini, 24 October 2009; and, following the protests of 17 November2010, Fifteen Charged with the Felony of Wearing a Hoodie [in Greek], Eleftherotypia,18 November 2010; NTUA Anger Over Charges, Kathimerini, 19 November 2009;Prosecution of the Rector of EMP for Indymedia [in Greek], To Vima, 18 November2009; Amnesty International, Greece: Alleged Abuses in the Policing of Demonstrations(London: Amnesty International Publications, 2009).

62. See Amnesty International,Greece(see note 61 above). As also illustrated by the pre-dominant imagery and discourse of the December 2008 protests; see, e.g., Aris Chatzistefanou(ed.), December 08: History, We are Coming . . . Look at the Sky [in Greek] (Athens: Livanis,2009); Melina Charitatou-Synodinou (ed.), Ash and. . . Burberry: December 2008 ThroughSlogans, Pictures and Texts [in Greek] (Athens: KWM, 2010); Alexandros Kyriakopoulosand Efthymios Gourgouris (eds.), Anxiety: A Record of the Spontaneous December 2008 [inGreek] (Athens: Kastaniotis, 2009).

63. See National Federation of the Blind (E.O.T.), The Blind Get Tear-gassed! [inGreek], Press Release, 12 March 2010; Glezos Sprayed with Teargas [in Greek], Elefthero-typia, 5 March 2010; Police Gas Mutineers: Riot Squad Moves In Against Colleagues inCentral Athens Protest, Kathimerini, 10 October 2003; European Confederation of Police,Peaceful Demonstrations Not Mutiny, Press Release, 10 October 2003. Journalists havealso reported growing violence against them by the police during public protests; see OlivierBasille and Angelique Kourounis, Greece: Is the Crisis in Greece a Chance for Its Media?(Paris: Reporters Without Borders, 2011).

64. See Hellenic Police: Special Guards. The Institution [in Greek], Official Infor-mation Website of Members of the Union of Special Guards, Hellenic Police of Attica, availableat: http://www.sefeaa.gr/ (accessed 15 May 2011).

65. See further Xenakis, Organized Crime and Political Violence (see note 12 above).

66. See, e.g., Nasos Theodorides,2009 Annual Report of the Information and Documenta-tion Centre on Racism ANTIGONE [in Greek] (Athens: Antigone, 2010), 114; The Year ofthe Black Terror [in Greek],Eleftherotypia3 January 2010; Grenade Attack in Exarchia [inGreek], Ta Nea, 25 February 2009; Syriza: New Outbreak of Racial Violence in AgiosPanteleimonas [in Greek], I Avgi, 9 September 2009; Racist Attacks Fuelling Tensions,Kathimerini, 19 November 2010.

67. See, e.g., Achilleas Chekimolgou, The Extra-Parliamentary Right Organize andAttack [in Greek], To Vima, 5 April 2009; Attacks on Immigrants on the Rise in Greece,New York Times, 1 December 2010.

68. See e.g., Dimitris Psarras, The Privatisation of Nazism [in Greek], KyriakatikiEleftherotypia, 28 November 2010.

69. On the mass far-right attack on immigrants in central Athens of 2011, see: Pogromagainst Immigrants by Racist Groups [in Greek], Eleftherotypia, 12 May 2011; Far-Right

Protest in Athens Turns Violent, Associated Press, 12 May 2011.70. See, e.g., The Blackshirts of the Police [in Greek], Eleftherotypia, 10 February

2008.71. Chrysochoidis on the Police and Agios Panteleimonas: I Know about Chrysi Avgi

I will Stop the Abuses [in Greek], Eleftherotypia, 21 October 2009. Later that year, theMinister also talked of the rise of new far-right violent groups, and the possibility thatright-wing violence might reach terrorist proportions in the future: Michalis Chrysochoidis:I Dont Pray In Front of the Icon of Stalin [in Greek],To Vima, 13 December 2009. In 1997,a previous Minister of Public Order, Georgos Romeos, had admitted that some police hadgood relations with Chrysi Avgi, but the existence of systematic good relations were deniedby government spokesman Dimitris Reppas the following year: The Lower Ends of thePolice [in Greek], Eleftherotypia, 29 September 1998.

72. See the Demand for Right-Wing Extremism Index of the political consultancygroup Political Capital, which is based on data from the European Social Surveys. Accordingto the Index, the percentage of Greeks predisposed to right-wing extremism rose from 14.6% in

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2005 to 17% in 2009, a fairly high level by European comparison: Political Capital, Back byPopular Demand: Demand for Right-Wing Extremism (DEREX) Index (Budapest: PoliticalCapital Policy Research and Consulting Institute, 2010). On the scapegoating of immigrantsin Greece, see Miltos Pavlou, Annual Report 2007: Racism and Discrimination against Immi-grants and Minorities in Greece. The State of Play (Athens: Hellenic Le

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