[ALBSA-Info] The National Herald

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The National Herald: Anti-Americanism In Greece Has Reached Dangerous Proportions (T. Mihas)


The National Herald
New York, 3 March 2002


Anti-Americanism In Greece Has Reached Dangerous Proportions

By Takis Michas
Special to The National Herald

One morning in early February, the United States Ambassador in Athens,
Thomas Miller and his wife were on their way to visit a high school in the
Aigaleo district of Athens. Invited by the school principal, they were to
take part in the presentation of an international environmental school
project called ³Globe².
This U.S.-financed project is very popular among the pupils and it
involves a number of schools around the world. The visit never materialized.
A
group of militant communist youths forcibly prevented the entry of the
U.S.
ambassador and his group in the school premises. At the same time they
attacked the ambassador¹s bodyguards and broke into a fight with the Greek
police that had rushed, somehow belatedly, to the scene. The Communist
Party of Greece is one of the strongest non-reformed communist parties in
the
world and is known to regularly incite anti-American protests. The U.S.
Embassy in Athens quickly denounced the event and expressed its regrets
about the fact that this group ³provoked incidents forcing the ambassador
to leave the premises.² The event received scant attention in the Greek
news
media and neither the Greek government nor any Greek political party felt
the need to publicly condemn what had happened and express their sympathy
with the US diplomats. This event was in many ways symbolic of Greece¹s
political evolution during the last 20 years. It manifested once again the
chronic inability or unwillingness of the Greek political class to
confront openly what perhaps constitutes the most dangerous development in
the
political culture of the country during the last decade. Namely the rise of
a virulent anti-Americanism which attacks not only what America does but
also, in many cases, what America is. Protests against US
dignitaries are not unique of course to Greece. They also take place in
other Western democracies. However there are some aspects in this event
that render it unique. Firstly it was the first time in the recent history
of
Greece that the public appearance of a diplomat of a foreign country was
canceled due to the use of force by a Greek political party. Something
similar had never happened in Greece¹s recent history even when diplomats
of countries like Libya, Iraq, or (Milosevic¹s) Serbia of somehow
checkered
democratic credentials took part in similar events. Secondly not a single
arrest was made and no charges were pressed against the militants who tried
and succeeded in preventing by violent means the free dialogue and the free
exchange of information. Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, neither the
government nor any political party in the country denounced publicly this
planned in advance action by the activists
of the Communist Party.The only (unofficial) reaction came from the Greek
Minister of Education who reportedly expressed his dissatisfaction with the
fact that the US
ambassador had not informed him of his impending visit to the school!
Trying not to upset the communists is nothing new in Greek politics. Both
the PASOK governing party as well as the opposition New Democracy party(as
well as the present leader of the Orthodox Church of Greece) go frequently
out of their way not to say or do anything that may upset the comrades on
the Left. Indeed Greece must be the only country in the world where the
term ³anti-Communist² still carries, to this very day and age, strong
negative
connotations. Thus a few days after the incident involving the US
ambassador, the General Secretary of PASOK Costa Laliotis, in an interview
to the Greek daily ³Eleftherotypia², called for a united front with the
Left in the next national elections including the Communist party. Not to
be outdone the
opposition conservative New Democracy party and its present leader make also
frequently common cause with the Communists in supporting the economic
demands of any segment of the population-even if it is a group pamperedby
subsidies like the farmers. Both for PASOK as well as
for New Democracy winning the elections and enjoying the spoils of power
are
paramount. Confronting the rising tide of anti-americanism is not.
This is unfortunate since it leaves the considerable number of Greek
intellectuals, scholars and journalists who expressed their support to the
US after the 9-11 events without any political backing while at the same
time it constitutes an implicit acceptance of the fact that backing US
policies constitutes a high risk strategy in Greece.
> >> * Takis Michas is a journalist living in Athens.
> >>


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