Greek newspaper condemned on racist remarks (!)

Wow, I can’t say that I’m not impressed! On March 5th a greek court condemned the publisher, the editor and the journalist of the newspaper Eleftheros Kosmos for the article of the latter that «insulted the religious group of the Jews«. The article appeared in 2006 and the lawsuit was an initiative of the Greek Helsinki Monitor which again proves worthy of it’s fame!

What did they guy said? The usual stuff like «Thank God not even 1500 Jews aren’t left in Thessaloniki…» , «…the supposed saponification of the Jews…». Nothing new that I can’t hear every other day in some obscure or less obscure media. This time, maybe following the recent conviction of nazi-admirer K.Plevris, a greek court decided that this constitutes a violation of the renown but never applied anti-racism law 927/1979. The court decided that they expressed hate and denied the extermination of thousands of jews. For this Zafiropoulos Dimitrios, Georgiou Theodoros and Chatzigogos Theodoros were convicted to 7 months of probation the first two and 7 months to be bought with 5 euros/diem for the latter.

For the first time it was also allowed for the Central Jewish Board, (ΚΙΣ), to appear as civil part which overruled the previous scandalous decision during the Plevris trial. The well-known politicians S.Vougias and G.Boutaris were absent despite the fact that initially they had testified since the article had involved their names too.

What can I say? That I didn’t expect it but still it’s some great piece of news. Certainly will not deter any other racist journalist but acts as a statement that the greek Justice system recognizes that this stuff is the expression of pure hatred and Greece, at least in principle, does not accept it. In other words it’s a nice moral support which certainly is a positive step to the right direction – congrats on Petropoulou Salata, Tsangari and Velissariou who were the court members for their courage to apply the law and of course the Greek Helsinki Monitor.

DeviousDiva also posted about it and has the english translation of the  court decision.

Blog Freedom threatened in Greece

Greek Government in it’s infinite wisdom still doesn’t get how the Internet actually works and gives me the opportunity to differ somewhat from the usual stuff I write about.

Recently a greek political blog by a known journalist was accused of being used as a means to blackmail known politicians and entrepreneurs. I have no idea on the veridicity of the accusations but given the rotten nature of the press system in Greece I have no reason to doubt, (or believe them). The Greek Government though, alarmed by the growing popularity of blogs, decided to take a stance against the whole phenomenon and has drawn the blueprint for a new law governing the functioning of the blogs.

Roughly it says that all informative blogs should loose their anonymity and post the name of their owner; plus other stuff like facilitating the police to track down bloggers etc. Anyway here’s a Press Release, (in greek), which I sign and expresses my personal views on the matter via yorgos.

Another interesting post on the subject with a better summary by j95.