Background information and constant updates in English on Revolutionary Struggle Case and Actforfreedomnow!
Social revolution is not a past; it is the present and future of the world.
Regarding the call for international solidarity and action
As assembly for the Revolutionary Struggle case and in continuance of solidarity actions for the same cause, we address an open callout for a solidarity campaign at both the local and international level on the 22nd, 23rd and 24th of November 2012.
We have decided to break the wall of silence surrounding the RS case, and thus demonstrate that the comrades currently undergoing trial are not alone, that the RS case is everyone’s case in regard to the essence of the struggle itself. We therefore call comrades from across the world to contribute their action and send their own message of Solidarity and Struggle.
Our goal is to diffuse the dynamic resistances under a revolutionary perspective. Our aim is to expand the struggle for the overthrow of the existent, showing its historical necessity and importance in the present, as well as our factual solidarity with the comrades on trial.
The three-day international call for solidarity, counter-information and action for the RS case is part and continuation of the class and social war towards subversion and Revolution. This is how we perceive the RS case and how it can be recorded historically as a whole.
A short background on the Revolutionary Struggle case
On March 10th, 2010, anarchist comrade Lambros Foundas was murdered after an armed scuffle with police forces. Those were the days when Greece was first subjected to the stifling scrutiny of the IMF/ECB/EU Troika, those were the days when Lambros Foundas, member of the Revolutionary Struggle group, lost his life in a shootout with the police during a preparatory action aimed against the political and economic elite that ravages the planet, and plunders and exsanguinates social wealth globally, relegating human life to rock bottom.
After a month and amid a climate of terror-hysteria, in April 2010 the police made preemptive detentions in order to dismantle the Revolutionary Struggle group, and also arrested and imprisoned anarchists Kostas Gournas, Nikos Maziotis and Pola Roupa, who took political responsibility for their participation in the organization.
Simultaneously, anarchists Vaggelis Stathopoulos, Christoforos Kortesis and Sarantos Nikitopoulos were caught and sent to prison. The latter three categorically deny any participation in the organization ever since their arrest, stating that their prosecution concerns their years-long involvement in subversive projects, their political affiliation to the anarchist/anti-authoritarian space and their comradely relationships.
Kostas Katsenos is also charged with participation in the group, and ever since the period of these pretrial incarcerations an arrest warrant was pending against him, too.
The system wanted to deliver a decisive blow to the organization, deeming Revolutionary Struggle as a threat; therefore, it expanded its offensive through the aforementioned arrests so as to crush a wider part of the subversive movement.
After six months, in the context of this expansion of the repressive offensive, dozens of comrades from the anarchist/anti-authoritarian milieu were called to testify and underwent interrogations, along with friends and relatives of the six imprisoned anarchists.
The vindictiveness of repression mechanisms was proved once again, when the State went as far as to charge Marie Beraha—spouse of Kostas Gournas—with participation in the group. This prosecution is a purely vindictive act against Kostas Gournas, in an effort to curb his combatant stance.
On October 5th, 2011, the RS case trial got underway in the special court of Koridallos prisons, in a closed room, with complete absence of any publicity. While the mass media always seemed eager to aid the repressive offensive and state propaganda, nowadays they keep silent—in a provocative way and under a political mandate—about anything related to the court proceeding of the RS case.
On the one hand, the regime is conducting a trial against its political adversaries and wants to gag any message of struggle and to distort its meaning. On the other hand, the three comrades, who took political responsibility for their participation in the organization, have defended its actions and political plan. At the same time, with their statements in court, all defendants in this case have converted the trial sessions into a harsh reproach upon the political-economic system of wretchedness and exploitation, unveiling the nature of laws and specific treatments that are enforced against those who have the strength to resist.
It must be emphasized that none of the accused comrades is currently imprisoned. Vaggelis Stathopoulos, Sarantos Nikitopoulos and Chistoforos Kortesis were ordered released after 12 months of pretrial incarceration. Kostas Katsenos presented himself to the authorities at the beginning of the trial, and was held imprisoned for six months before being released. Revolutionary Struggle members Kostas Gournas, Nikos Maziotis and Pola Roupa were released from prison after 18 months, when the maximum period of pretrial detention expired.
Today, Nikos Maziotis and Pola Roupa are at large (!) and no longer attend the court proceeding.
As we write these lines, the trial is at the stage of defense witnesses’ testimonies. Already, the witnesses in defense of Revolutionary Struggle members K.Gournas, N.Maziotis and P.Roupa gave their statements in court. In particular, comrades from Greece and abroad argued the significance of the Revolutionary Struggle group in political and historical terms, and defended armed struggle as well as the entirety and breadth of revolutionary ventures. In the upcoming days, the court will hear witnesses’ testimonies for the defense of V.Stathopoulos, K.Katsenos, S.Nikitopoulos, Ch.Kortesis and M.Beraha, who deny their participation in the organization, nevertheless demonstrate the importance of struggle and the need to resist.
During the days of this international appeal, in late November, it is estimated that the trial will likely be nearing the defendants’ statements. It is thus considered as very important to receive messages of solidarity and resistance from comrades all over the world, who can show in their own way that the accused comrades are not alone, that the struggle for the overthrow of this world is always timely.
The RS case seen from within the social, economic and political situation in Greece
To understand all of the aspects and the significance of the RS case, we must take the specific historical, social and political context under consideration, in which the State is being shielded by prosecutions, arrests, imprisonments, special legislation and special courts.
The RS case trial is taking place at a time when the regime finds itself in a structural crisis, and democratic facades have collapsed. The ferocity with which the contemporary regime wields over our lives has very little to envy when it comes to dictatorships of the past. The brutal exploitation and the extended control over our lives are suggested as the only way out of the crisis, naturally leaving the system that created, imposed and expanded the crisis to all spheres of personal and social life unscathed.
Therefore, today’s regime requires the political extermination and political exclusion of those who are fighting against it, resisting its plans, and working for its overthrow. The cause of revolutionary perspective and overthrow of the regime becomes objectively relevant in this era, in Greece of debt crisis. The system tries to halt and gag the very momentum and multiformity of struggles. The very concept of solidarity is being targeted and subjected to trials.
A few words on the international setting
Apart from the particular characteristics of Greece in a period of crisis, it would be a mistake to regard the RS case as a circumstance isolated from the international setting. The crisis does not occur from nowhere; it lies at the heart of the global capitalist system, in the manner of governance and economic exploitation imposed by the rulers of this world. We know very well that this world was never freely given to those who dynamically resist these plans; that the struggle for human and social liberation has always been a rough road; that the relations between fighters have great worth and are an important component of the struggle’s substance and its conduct. Let fighters across the world know that they are not alone. Let the rulers know that emergency laws, special courts and incarceration regimes cannot halt the essence of the struggle itself.
Against special laws, special courts and special conditions of detention
Solidarity with those that stand trial for the Revolutionary Struggle case
Solidarity with fighters and all those prosecuted for their subversive action across the world
We neither forget, nor forgive
Honour forever to anarchist comrade Lambros Foundas,
member of the organization Revolutionary Struggle
Assembly for the RS case
Contact mail: RScase[at]espiv[dot]net