Workers and youth in Greece were looking to deliver a huge blow to the current right-wing government of Kyriakos Mitsotakis in yesterday’s parliamentary elections.
The huge militant mobilisations and the two general strikes in Greece last March, following the Tempi train crash on 28 February where over 100 people, mostly students, were killed, expressed the rage and class hatred of workers and youth against the Mitsotakis parliamentary junta regime which has imposed the barbaric Austerity Accords dictated by the EU and IMF.
These experiences and mobilisations have transformed the consciousness of large sections of the working class, youth and students in Greece.
They have rejected the SYRIZA ‘lefts’ and the PASOK social-democrats who are fanatical supporters of the EU and NATO’s war in the Ukraine against Russia.
Due to the electoral system of so-called ‘proportional representation’ neither of the two main bourgeois parties, Mitsotakis’ New Democracy Party nor A.
Tsipras’ SYRIZA, has the forces to gain more than 150 seats to form a government in the 300 seats Vouli (Greek parliament).
International banks and bourgeois financial agencies have voiced their desire, through JP Morgan and Reuters, for a re-election of Mitsotakis who they say provides ‘stability’ and follows to the letter the EU – IMF – NATO dictates. They urge the PASOK party to stay away from SYRIZA and form a coalition government with Mitsotakis.
These conspiracies of imperialism are undermined by the economic crisis and most importantly by the will of workers and youth in Greece to carry on the fight against the Austerity Accords and whichever capitalist government.
These conditions which have created an acute political crisis in Greece and Sunday’s elections will deepen this crisis. The bourgeoisie are hoping to resolve it through new elections in July. Yet the world economic crisis and war are creating such volatile conditions which will inflame workers’ and youths’ mobilisations.
For the Greek Communist Party, KKE, the result of the elections is already at hand since they predict a victory for the bourgeois parties New Democracy or SYRIZA.
In electoral numerical terms that might be true, but the essence here is that the chaotic economic and political conditions could create explosive conditions given the rage of workers and youth.
The KKE urges people to vote for them so that more KKE deputies are elected and thus more pressure will be exerted on whichever government!
This is wretched reactionary reformism which aims to prevent workers marching on the revolutionary road for a workers’ government and to the overthrow of rotten outmoded capitalism.
The small left and centrist parties coalition ANTARSYA are calling for the overthrow of the accords’ governments and for a workers’ government.
Yet they stubbornly refuse to call for a general strike and for the overthrow of capitalism.
ANTARSYA will attract votes from youths, students and workers who have been in the forefront of the recent strike tsunami and the students’ occupations in parallel to the historic strikes in France, Britain, Germany.
In such conditions the absolute need becomes evident for a revolutionary party which will call for the unity of working class in an indefinite political general strike to smash the Austerity Accords and capitalism.
This is an issue of the developing European Revolution and the fight of workers and youth in Greece is right in the front.
- Meanwhile, on Friday hundreds of people have protested in Hiroshima where the US-led Group of Seven leaders met to stiffen sanctions on Russia, provide further support for Ukraine and discuss growing tensions with China.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who holds the rotating G7 presidency, met with US President Joe Biden ahead of the summit which ended yesterday.
Officials said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky would attend in person over the weekend.
In a joint statement on Friday, they said existing measures against Russia would be broadened and any exports that could help it in its 15-month special military operation in Ukraine would be restricted across the G7 countries.
They said: ‘This includes exports of industrial machinery, tools, and other technology that Russia uses to rebuild its war machine and that they would also try to restrict Russian revenues from trade in metals and diamonds.
Members of the G7 include the United States, Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Canada and Italy.
Ahead of the summit, Kishida and Biden discussed further strengthening what they called the deterrence of the Japan-US alliance and decided to develop Japan-US-South Korea cooperation.
A protester and trade unionist surnamed Niishima said: ‘Biden is in the land of Hiroshima and he’s brought a button along to fire a nuclear missile, I cannot forgive him for this. He needs to apologise to the people in Hiroshima.
Kishida, who represents Hiroshima in Japan’s lower house of parliament, said he chose the city for the summit to focus attention on arms control.
Hiroshima, and another Japanese city, Nagasaki, were destroyed by US nuclear attacks 78 years ago.
The aerial bombings together killed up to 226,000 people, most of whom were civilians, and remain the only use of nuclear weapons in an armed conflict.
Hiroshima has become the scene of angry protests, condemning the ‘imperialist summit’, with police officers from across the country patrolling the area.
Hundreds of protesters rallied on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in front of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial, also known as the Atomic Bomb Dome, at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, which will be closed until next Monday for the summit.
Carrying banners and signs such as ‘Crush the G7 Summit’ and ‘No War-themed Conference’, the protesters chanted slogans such as ‘No Japan-US leaders talk’ and ‘Withdraw US military bases in Japan.’
The protesters, including university students and family members of atomic bomb victims, gathered along one of Hiroshima’s main streets, which was crowded with police more than 10 times the number of protesters.
Niishma added: ‘I am absolutely against war.
‘I am against using nuclear weapons. That is why I am here.
‘This summit is being held to prepare for a nuclear war.
‘Biden won’t apologise for US nuclear massacres in Hiroshima, Nagasaki during Japan visit.’
Ryo Miyahara, head of a group of Hiroshima citizens and one of the organisers of the demonstration, said the talks between the US and Japanese leaders on Thursday, would ultimately lead to the promotion of a military alliance between the two countries in East Asia.
Akamine Chiaki, a college student from Okinawa speaking at Thursday’s rally said: ‘Today’s talks will definitely ignore the ideas of ordinary people.
‘Japan and the United States are trying to conduct a war of aggression on China.’
Another protester, surnamed Kawano said: ‘I am protesting because I absolutely cannot accept the fact that they are in Hiroshima, a place where an atomic bomb was dropped, trying to hold a meeting to start a nuclear war.’
Apart from the G7 members, Japan has invited India, Australia, Brazil, South Korea, Vietnam, Indonesia, the Cook Islands and the Comoros Islands, as well as the heads of several international organisations, including the United Nations, the World Bank and the World Health Organisation to the summit.
Former US president Barack Obama was the first American president to visit the Peace Memorial in Hiroshima in 2016.
He did not apologise for the only combat use of nuclear weapons in history, nor did he renounce US president Harry Truman’s decision to carry out the monumental massacres.
The US continues to boastfully justify the bombings and the ensuing carnage, contending that they were necessary to end the war and ‘save lives,’ although many historians question that view and insist they were unjustified.
The G7 is an intergovernmental political forum.
The European Union is a ‘non-enumerated member’ and has participated in the summit since the 1980s.
The group changed to the G8 with Russia joining in 1998. In 2014, however, Russia was excluded over the Ukrainian crisis.
