Around 40 MPs from the ruling conservative New Democracy party sent an ultimatum to the government on Friday warning all concerned that if the "anti-racist" bill which is currently being debated in Parliament does not include three more crucial genocides, then they will simply oppose it. Specifically, the MPs argue that the Armenian Genocide, the Genocide of the Greeks in Pontus and the Genocide of the Greeks in Asia Minor must be included in the new hate law, and not extracted as some (members from the Left) would prefer.
The ultimatum was handed over to Justice Minister Haralambos Athanassiou by a representative group of New Democracy parliamentarians, who did not stop short from noting that the above genocides should not be ignored in the new bill as well as those that have already been formerly recognized by the Greek Parliament.
The ND rebels, who basically demanded the obvious, were strongly supported by parliamentary spokesperson Makis Voridis, as well as legal documentation from the Secretary General of the Government, Panagiotis Baltakou.
The new bill, which was submitted by the Justice Minister, foresees tough penalties for racially-motivated crimes (jail sentences of up to three years and financial penalties of up to 20,000 euros for incitement to racist attacks). Sounds pretty fair right? Unfortunately its not. This is what the mainstream media is saying about the bill. The truth is that if the bill is passed then it will allow Kemalist and Islamist fascists in Athens and Thessaloniki to freely ridicule and mock the Greek victims of the Pontus, and Asia Minor genocides (and their descendants). At the same time it will ignore racist remarks about the Armenian and Assyrian genocides, because these genocides have not been recognized by the Greek or international court system! And this is what they are betting on!
In some twisted way, the anti-racist bill is actually extremely racist towards Greek citizens and this is because it only penalizes those who deny foreign genocides and not those that were imposed on the Greek and Armenian peoples (which have already been recognized by the whole world, but as we stated above have yet to be recognized formerly by the international court system)!
The Minister of Justice was comfortable with these demands, but PASOK and its leader Evangelos Venizelos are not! As incredible as this sounds, reports on Friday said that Venizelos does not want this provision to be included in the bill at all.
His stance on this issue should only be characterized as being tragic, and anyone who is of Greek origin, or who has half an ounce of knowledge about Greek history, should criticize him strongly for this refusal.
HellasFrappe believes that one of the reasons that he is so fixated in his stance is because he is being supported by the technocrats of parliament (yes the same group that was led by Costas Simitis, and unfortunately this also includes quite a few conservatives). Why? Well, if you go look at Greece's recent history (meaning the past 20 years) then you will note that following the incident at Imia, the socialist conducted quite a bit of "secret diplomacy" with Turkey on matters that deal with the Aegean (examples, Imia, Ocalan, etc.). We are convinced that Papandreou did, so why wouldn't Venizelos?
Frappers, as much as it pains us to say this, there are quite a few parliamentarians in New Democracy that are comfortable with the bill just the way it is. Of course, PASOK and DIMAR are 100 percent in favor and believe it or not those who are opposed to the new law are SYRIZA, KKE and the Golden Dawn party. The Independent Greek party has not yet announced what sort of action it will take, but we want to believe that it will also oppose the bill.
On February 24, 1994, the Greek Parliament unanimously voted on proclaiming May 19 as the "Day of Remembrance for the Genocide of the Greeks in Asia Minor" and some may argue that this recognition will continue to be fully respected by the Greek state. So why all the fuss?
Well we want to point your attention to an article that was featured in last week's Sunday edition of the Dimokratia newspaper. In this article, Savvas Kalterides, a novelist, researcher and geopolitical expert on Turkish and Kurdish affairs said that anyone who votes for this "monstrosity" of a bill is a traitor of the Greek people. The argument behind his strong statement stems on the fact that the new law domestically and internationally excludes the genocides of the Greeks of Pontus, of Asia Minor, the Armenians and even the Assyrian peoples. And he predicted that if the bill came to pass then it would cancel the three existing laws which are recognized by the Greek Parliament.
(Essentially, we would be basically poking our own eyes out and this time it would be Greeks performing a genocide on Greeks.)
The article in Dimokratia mobilized quite a few people, including Thessaloniki MP Savvas Anastasiadis, who has been very active in the past on matters of Greek national interest much to the disappointment of the Turkish Consulate in Komotini which has worked feverishly in northern Greece in spreading hate. According to Kalteridis, Anastasiadis mobilized approximately forty members of his party, who requested a meeting with the Minister of Justice Mr Athanasiou, to express their objections to the bill and to unequivocally state that they will not vote on it unless these provisions were changed.
In a follow-up article, which was published on Friday, Kalterides revealed that the New Democracy party held a heated in house debate to discuss this matter and strong opposition to the bill was openly voiced by many leading cadres.
HellasFrappe cannot predict how our parliamentarians will vote on this racist against the Greeks anti-racist bill, but certainly we are grateful that there are still many MPs in the New Democracy party who were not dazzled by power and remain true to the ideologies of ND as well as patriots to their country, and its history.
The only thing that is certain, and which is noted by Kalterides, is that Turkey will once again attempt to intervene on this matter by sparking up some sort of provocation in its relations with Cyprus, in the Aegean and even in the area of Thrace, so that the Greek government can swing the vote in its favor.
It should be reminded that on 28.5.2013 the Turkish Foreign Ministry described the events for Memorial Day of the Pontian Genocide as being "hostile and racist initiatives" and had the audacity to call on the Greek parliament to discard those classifications that poison the Greco- Turkish friendship. And if that wasn't enough, the Turkish Ministry even went as far as advising the Greek government to "endorse the positions of DIMAR Rep. Mary Repousi" who we all know detests her Greek roots!
(Quick note on who Repousi is. She is the same MP who exited the Greek Parliament building twice when the House Speaker asked representatives to hold a moment of silence in respect to the over 300,000 Greeks who lost their lives during those genocides. She is also the same individual who had caused a national stir several years ago when she said that the slaughtering and butchering of Asia Minor Greeks was in fact just a "gathering" of peoples in a port area, and had the audacity to poison Greek textbooks with this.)
Kalterides also revealed something else that we found quite interesting. He writes that Turkey has been trying to persuade many nations to ignore matters that deal with genocides (and/or that were performed by Turkey), in view of the 100 years since the Armenian genocide, because it is expected that a wave of protest against this unspeakable massacre will peak globally.
We agree with Kalterides on one thing: the only way Greece can iron out its relations with Turkey is to finally force Ankara to recognize all the barbaric acts it has performed against hundreds of thousands of innocent Greek, Armenian and Assyrian people. Everything else, is just another excuse, or a path, that will once again lead all of us to Neo-Ottoman barbarity.
HellasFrappe agrees with anti-racist bill, but ONLY if it includes these provisions. Everything else is just heresay to us, and we pledge to fully support these 40 MPs as much as we can.
References
Posts
