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Greece: The riot police has declared war against students & the situation is about to explode

Scenes of the Greek Riot Police rampage across the streets of Thessaloniki, on Thursday 26 May 2022, are nothing but a glimpse of what’s been happening, almost daily, for more than a month and a half in this northern greek city and the situation is about to explode and spread across universities all over Greece.

In an attempt to appeal to the amalgam of its right wing, far right and neoliberal voters that hate free public education and the free movement of ideas that it entails, the right wing government of so-called “New Democracy” has established the daily presence of an army of riot cops in the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (ΑΠΘ). The police invaders, dressed like soldiers in khakis, along with all their lethal equipment, guns and bullets, flash –bang grenades, batons and asphyxiating gas grenades have been brutally attacking the academic community almost daily, like a criminal gang that tries to take over an area and establish its dominance through a terror campaign, violence and the spread of fear.

Attacks with batons and asphyxiating gas, throwing flash-bang grenades in closed spaces to cause hearing loss dragging students on the pavement to arrest them, firing flash-bang grenades with gun launchers at point blank in the faces of students is just part of a chaotic daily imagery in the University in Thessaloniki with a purpose. To quell any thoughts of protest to the government’s unprecedented plan to establish police stations inside universities campuses all over Greece, a plan that will be put into action in June 2022.

Thus, the images from Thessaloniki are both an experiment and an insight into the future of higher education institutions in Greece. But so is resistance. And the might of the giant that is the greek student movement when it finally awakes.