Greece: Free speech faces abyss

31 Oct 2012

The arrest of editor Kostas Vaxevanis for exposing alleged tax cheats is just the latest attack on free speech in Greece. Democracy itself is now in danger, say Asteris Masouras and Veroniki Krikoni

UPDATE: Since this article was published, journalist Spiros Karatzaferis was arrested on an outstanding charge after claiming he would publish classified documents relating to Greeces financial bailout. Read here

In recent months Greece has recorded multiple instances of censorship and attacks on the press. Systematic efforts to curtail media freedom are taking place against a backdrop of rising police brutality used to quell anti-austerity protests and mounting neo-Nazi violence against journalists,immigrants, and homosexuals linked to rise of the far-right Golden Dawn party, which gained 18 seats in Junes parliamentary elections (having achieved a record 21 seats in the May election).

28 October, National Day in Greece, sawthe arrest of investigative journalist Kostas Vaxevanis, whoseHot Doc magazine published a leaked list (nicknamed the Lagarde list) of over 2,000 names of Greeks with bank accounts in Switzerland. Reporters Sans Frontieresappealed for his release, the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, Dunja Mijatovi,expressed her concern, and netizens rallied to his support on Twitter, gathering over 16,000 signatures on apetition demanding that charges be dropped,as did the European Federation of Journalists.

They are after me instead of the truth,Vaxevanisstatedin a video uploaded on the night before his arrest.

A New York Times editorial slammed the Greek government for being shamefully quick to attack the messenger and strip basic social services from the countrys most vulnerable citizens but shamefully slow at probing possible tax evasion by the well-connected. Vaxevanis, whose magazine has been steadily publishing investigative reports on graft and corruption scandals, hadreported a seemingly abortive ambush at his home on the northern suburbs of Athens earlier in September by five unknown individuals.

Several other incidents of censorship have plagued the media in the last month, leading to international condemnation and grave concerns about the state of democracy in its nominal birthplace.

On 25 September, a 27-year-old netizen was remanded to trialonblasphemy charges for maintaining aFacebook page titled Gerontas Pastitsios (Elder Pastitsios), which included satirical comments on Christianity and the noted Eastern Orthodox monkElder Paisiosand his alleged prophecies, as well as the commercial exploitation of Paisioss legacy. The matter was raised by a member of parliament from Golden Dawn.According to the

On 9 October, the Guardian published areport by the Nations Maria Margaronis ontorture allegationsmade by anti-fascist protesters arrested after a clash with Golden Dawn members on 26 September, in which detainees spoke of being subjected to an Abu Ghraib-style humiliation at police headquarters in Athens. The inister of Public Order, Nikos Dendias, later announced hisintention to sue the British newspaper for defamation and instead of ordering a public inquiry while investigating the torture allegations in a sworn administrative inquiry, a processdescribed by the UNHCR in 2008 as an internal and confidential police procedure designed to protect the rights of the officer involved rather than those of the complainant.

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Greece: Free speech faces abyss