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The spatiality of a social struggle inGreece at the time of the IMFRegina Mantanika a & Hara Kouki ba Department of Social Science , University Paris 7b School of Law, Birkbeck College , University of London E-mail:Published online: 30 Aug 2011.

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Alternatives

The spatiality of a socialstruggle in Greece at the timeof the IMFReflections on the 2011 mass migranthunger strike in Athens

Regina Mantanika and Hara Kouki

The E110 billion bailout offered to the Greek government in May 2010 by the so-calledtroika (comprising of the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank andthe European Union) was not only the largest of its kind in Western history to date, italso marked the entrance of Greek society into a period of extreme turmoil, with profoundchanges in the standard of living and the everyday reality of large segments of the popu-lation. The countrys extensive public sector saw wage reductions, pension decreases andtax rises. In the private sector mass lay-offs and redundancies became widespread, as didwage reductions and renegotiations of labour contracts.Against this turbulent backdrop an extraordinary event would soon take place in the

cities of Athens and Thessaloniki. In early 2011, the beginning of the largest masshunger strike on European soil saw 300 undocumented migrants, mostly of Maghrebiorigin, demand the legalisation of all undocumented migrants in the country.Regina Mantanika and Hara Kouki, Athens-based researchers and activists, trace the

chronology of the strike in the city by looking at the series of different spacesbothpublic and privatethat took turns in hosting it: the Law Faculty of the University ofAthens, in which the migrants were quickly made unwelcome; the private mansion inwhich they found shelter and finally, the public hospitals to which many of them weretransferred and in which they ended their strike. Mantanika and Kouki offer us thepreliminary findings of their research on these spaces dynamics, the way in which theyinteracted with the strike and how the strike itself transformed some of these spaces inreturn.I can hardly think of a more appropriate topic and paper with which to launch my term

as editor of the Alternatives section of City, a section set to engage and discuss with groupsand individuals who are developing alternative urban visions and practices. Here wehave an extraordinary such example: the practice of a small number of people who never-theless forced us to rethink the distinctions between private and public, between local andforeign, between a struggle for life and for death. In a historical conjuncture where alterna-tives are desperately sought but seldom found, where the public retreats in the face of theprivate, tracing the spatiality of this newly encountered social struggle is a much neededand rewarding exercise.

Antonis Vradis, Alternatives Editor

ISSN 1360-4813 print/ISSN 1470-3629 online/11/03404829 # 2011 Taylor & FrancisDOI: 10.1080/13604813.2011.596324

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Introduction

In May 2010, the Greek state entered aE110 billion bailout agreement withthe International Monetary Fund

(IMF), the European Union (EU) and theEuropean Central Bank (ECB). The auster-ity measures taken in the wake of thebailout have been followed by sharplyincreasing unemployment figures, a signifi-cant deterioration of average living con-ditions for many and a significant shift inthe countrys political landscape: theextreme-right party of Chrysi Augi(Golden Dawn) was elected for the firsttime at local authority level, in Athens. InMarch 2011, the freshly named Ministryof Citizen Protection (previously knownas the Ministry of Public Order, adminis-tering the states policing and intelligenceservices) announced plans for the construc-tion of a protective wall along Greeces landborder with Turkey. The aim of its con-struction, as announced, was to deter therising number of undocumented migrantsfrom crossing the border and inundatingthe countrys urban centres and thecapital, Athens, in particular.Within this context a group of 300

migrants, permanently settled in the islandof Crete where they worked undocumentedand therefore without any labour rights,took the extraordinary decision to com-mence a mass hunger strike to demand thelegalisation of all undocumented migrantsliving in Greece. This social struggle wasunique in achieving a massive migrant par-ticipation and in articulating a maximalistdemand (some could say impractical orutopian) that challenged the inefficiency ofthe migration policies of the Greek state,opening up the agenda to issues that hadnot previously been debated often in public.The present paper does not aim to

present a comprehensive outline of themigrant hunger strike and its participants,or to judge its importance or impact onnational policies, public opinion or themigrants status in Greek society. Rather,

the paperforming part of ongoing field-work researchaims at this preliminarystage to trace this social struggle throughits differing spatialities as articulated inthe 43 days of its duration. We examinethe symbolisms and practicalities of the orig-inal decision for the hunger strike to behosted in a public, university space (theLaw Faculty of the University of Athens);the forced movement of the strikers to aprivate space soon thereafter, and the con-tinuation and culmination of the strike scat-tered across the hospitals where the strikerswere taken for treatment toward its end. Infocusing on these three places that hostedthe hunger strike, we aim to understandhow these gathered diverse individuals, pol-itical demands, national and internationalsolidarity, actions and words, but alsodoubts, hostile reactions and official/mediaattacks. We have divided the paper intothree parts that correspond to the shiftingspatiality of the hunger strike through time,and so we illustrate the formation of thosedifferent spaces that eventually elevated thissocial struggle into a focal point of referencein the countrys political arena.(1) On 24 January 2011, 300 migrants

arrived at the Faculty of Law in the Uni-versity of Athens, where they had decidedto commence the hunger strike. Havingchosen the city of Thessaloniki as thesecond locus of their struggle, 50 of themtravelled there to settle at the LabourCentre of the city. From the beginning,two decision-making assemblies wereformed, one of the hunger strikers andanother of those in solidarity.

We are migrant men and women, refugeesfrom all over Greece. We came here to escapepoverty, unemployment, wars anddictatorships. Whether by regular or irregularentry, we came to Greece and are working tosupport ourselves and our families. We livewithout dignity, in the dark shadow ofillegality. We ask for the legalization of allmigrant men and women, we ask for the samepolitical and social rights and obligations asGreek workers. Support our struggle! We do

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not have any other way to make our voicesheard, to raise awareness of our rights. Threehundred (300) of us will go on hunger strike inAthens and in Thessaloniki on the 25 January2011. Wewould rather die here than allow ourchildren to suffer what we have beenthrough.1

The original official reaction to the strikewas summarised in the declaration of theMinistry of Internal Affairs: there is nochance or possible frame of a massive cri-teria-free legalization of foreign people whohave entered and live in the country illeg-ally.2 This was in line with the migrationpolicy of the Greek state in recent years: thedoctrine of zero tolerance3 reflected inincreasingly repressive policies forcing undo-cumented migrants to a continuous wander-ing, a precarious living and an inescapablyillegal status.Why was the Law Faculty chosen as a

locus of the hunger strike? Under Greeklaw, and due to a tradition of strugglestracing back to the dictatorial (196774) era,university premises enjoy asylum statusand are off limits to police unless specificallyinvited by university authorities or if a life-threatening crime is being committed. More-over, the so-called historic building of theLaw Faculty, which was not being used foracademic purposes at the time as it wasundergoing renovation, is a space that hashosted some major social struggles in thepast; a place where medical and legalsupport as well as civil protection would beprovided to those on strike; a place in thevery centre of the city next to other importantpublic buildings and a focal point for hun-dreds of people passing by daily. Evenbefore the migrants arrival in Athens, theLaw Faculty was already deemed to be anappropriate space in the city centre forhosting a mass hunger strike of undocumen-ted migrants in need of public visibility, aswell as protection.It is easy to understand the high symbolism

of this space by simply looking at both cor-porate and state television and press coverage,

which persistently focused on the location ofthe hunger strike, rather than the substance ofits demandswhich nevertheless were recog-nised as just by many.4 Many intellectuals,journalists and people in the streets couldnot but acknowledge and denounce theharsh conditions under which those migrantshad to live; and yet this was not enough, inmost peoples eyes, to legitimise their pres-ence and illegal status in such a symbolicallycharged building. For the first time in Greekterritory foreigners occupy a university at theexpense of the educational process transform-ing it to the base from where they willproject their demand.5 Thirty-five universityprofessors, echoing a considerable part ofpublic opinion, denounced in public theoccupation of the Law Faculty by migrantsas an abhorrent abuse of the sacred andpublic space of the Law Faculty and as a con-tributory factor to the collapse of democraticinstitutions in a country already deep incrisis.6 This included individuals from thecountrys popular Left, who started worryingthat such an occupation could endanger aca-demic asylum and affect domestic move-ments hosted there.7 Repression andinjustice were denounced, but these peoplecould still not be publicly visible, let aloneoccupy a space of their own. It seemedthat those legally non-existent and publiclyunseen could deserve public opinions andofficial representatives sympathy, but theycould not quite become part of the bodypolitic of the country.

We got used lately to the idea that there weresome miserable people around ourneighbourhood. They started getting moreand more, occupying more places, approachingour houses, our abandoned storehouses, ourgarbage, our windows. We were afraid thatthey would intrude into our house. And, oneday, all of a sudden, we saw them sitting in themiddle of our living room. They wanted to diein our living room. That was too much. Theycould die of hunger in the streets, in packedflats, in camps, on traffic islands; we could livewith that, at the very end we could turn in the

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other direction, but not in front of our eyes.But not in our living room, you could go anddie elsewhere. Go and die elsewhere.8

Aided by media coverage that largelyignored the fact that the migrants were on ahunger strike and shifted the emphasistowards their illegal status, the Rector of theLaw Faculty decided to revoke the univer-sitys asylum status on 27 January and to effec-tively expel the migrants from the Facultyspace. On hearing that the police were prepar-ing to enter the building, a significant numberof people started gathering in the area, whilemuch media coverage predicted that anotherround of the December 2008 unrest could bepossible.9 Inside the Law Faculty negotiationshad already started between the Rector andthe universitys legal representatives on theone hand and the hunger strikers and somepeople in solidarity with them on the other.

(2) In the small hours of the thirdnightof thehunger strike, on 27 January 2011, the stri-kers left the Law Faculty building. Togetherwith people who were with them in solidar-ity, they moved to another central Athensbuilding (privately owned),10 to be knownas Ypatia, where they would continue theirstrike.When the migrants arrived at Ypatia, all

eight rooms of the mansion were locked. Theheating was off and the building was freezingcold. The toilets were inoperative and filledwith luxury furniture that had been removedfrom the corridors. There was no water.Around half of the hunger strikers wereallowed to lie on the floor of the corridorsand the rest were left outside on the lawn infront of the building. Tents were graduallyerected to host them outside the buildingduring some particularly cold and rainydays. Organising solidarity actions was alsodifficult, if not impossible; there was nospace for assemblies, organising mobilis-ations, dispersing information or becomingvisible in the city.11 All this was in sharp con-trast to the Faculty of Law, a place that couldturn the hunger strike into a public event and a

central political issue and incorporate it in aseries of political struggles. The inappropri-ateness of the newprivate space seemed topre-judge the strikes invisibility and quick demisefrom the public sphere.Therefore, the people who had been stand-

ing in solidarity with the hunger strikers werefaced with mounting difficulties and ques-tions on how to continue their strugglebeside the migrantsafter all this turmoil,should they articulate a political discourseon their own,12 should the public debaterevolve around the expulsion from the LawFaculty as an indication of xenophobia,should they look for another place to hostthis complicated strugglehow could theycontinue their actions from such an inap-propriate and private space? Debates, discus-sions, feelings of defeatism, however, were allsuperseded and silenced by the migrants owninsistence on their hunger strike being theonly space of struggle, obliging those insolidarity to remain in Ypatia.

We, the 250 migrant hunger strikers, are notwhat has been presented by the media; that is,those poor, impoverished, without house, joband clothes migrants etc. We already havehomes, families and jobs in the towns we leftbehind. We are not looking foraccommodation here in Athens; we just cameto fight . . . for our regularization, for ourrights and for decent living conditions.13

The war of lies which flooded the mediaduring the early days of the hunger strike atthe Law faculty has now come to an end; themisleading discussion about academic asylumis now put aside; even some ministers admit atthis point that some of our arguments are just;it is about time, thus, for our just demand forlegalisation to be heard loudly.14

And yet, the striking images of living con-ditions in the Ypatia building circulating inthe press and the victimisation of the hungerstrikers allowed the issue to remain topical.The violent exposure of the 300 hunger stri-kers to inhuman conditions could not be over-shadowed just because Ypatia was a big andluxurious private mansion.15 Groups and

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individuals in solidarity with the hungerstrike started gradually but insistently gather-ing inside and outside Ypatia, patrols endingup in conversations with migrants and soli-darity people, among friends and othersmeeting for the first time, debates takingplace among a heterogeneous composition ofpeople who did or did not belong to a politicalgrouping, whose common point of referencewas their meeting in situ, at Ypatiathesewere what gradually created the space of thehunger strike. It transformed a private build-ing into a public scene of fermentation. Atthe same time, workers and trade unions,student and teachers unions, professionalassociations and antiracist groups, artists,journalists and intellectuals started expressingtheir support by issuing public declarations orin press conferences.16 Local councils, includ-ing that of Thessaloniki, issued statements ofsupport.17More andmore people andorganis-ations, including those hesitant at first, startedaffiliating with this struggle, some by disco-vering common ground between migrantsand local workers. Typical of the latter is aletter of support written by the Associationof TranslatorsEditorsProofreaders:

Greek professional translators (or editors orproofreaders) did not until recently have muchin common with illegal migrants. They wereseparated bywhat seemed tobe anunbridgeablegap created by decades of prosperity in ourcountry. However, the times are changing andthe gaps are bridged in ways that are all tootangible, all too ordinary, no matter how manyfences may be raised to perpetuate the sham ofdifferencesdifferences which disappear by theday.We feel the need to respond to the appeal forsolidarity issued by the Assembly of Solidaritywith the Hunger Strikers, by stating that withinthis misleading climate of polarised opinion thathas been created these last few days we standfirmly on the side of the hunger strikers. In theface of exploitation, poverty, misery, andpersecution, we are all equal, we are allforeigners. And we are all rightful claimants tothe same immunity.18

The same seemed to apply on an internationallevel, since from the very beginning

organisations, professional associations,intellectuals, politicians and individuals inun-dated the tiny space of Ypatia with theirmessages of solidarity and declarations ofsupport.19

You are fighting for what Europe willbecome. Those who ignore or oppose you are areal threat to the European legacy of universalemancipation. In our times of nationalistxenophobia, movements like yours offer ahope that emancipation is not a dead word.(Slavoj Zizek)20

Actions of solidarity by organisations andindependent groups all over Greece, Europeand elsewhere21including texts, banners,talks, dissemination of information, concerts,occupations, interruptions of streets andpublic services, and international days ofactionmade evident the inseparable linksbetween irregular migrants and the inter-national working class. Growing supportcame also from intellectuals and artists whoregarded the 300 hunger strikers as pioneers.What the hunger strike had achieved by this

phase was to transform a small private build-ing in a hardly visible corner of Athens into abroad platform of mobilisation and generate anew urban point of reference. People gather-ing there daily with the hunger strikersenacted a dynamic that transcended theplace of the struggle and magnified Ypatia,which would gradually and unexpectedlyexpand beyond its limited space to containactions and words of solidarity from aroundthe world. This network of support createda site of resistance that would keep ongrowing once its location began to disperseto hospitals around the country.

(3)During the32nddayof thehunger strike,on 25 February 2011, 13 hunger strikerswere transferred to hospitals, while some ofthem had already been hospitalised sincethe 28th day following fainting episodes.22

On the 34th day, 19more people were trans-ferred to various hospitals, while on the 39thday the number of those under medical carein hospitals rose to 81 in Athens and 17 in

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Thessaloniki.23On the 43rd day the numberof migrants who had been transferred tohospital rose to more than a hundred.24

According to the doctors attending thehunger strikers, great weight loss, electro-lytedisorders and fainting episodes, requiredthe daily transportation of strikers to hospi-tals since at anymoment there could be veryserious incidents risking permanent damagetovital organs suchas the heart, kidneys andliver.25

In thisway, the site of the struggle started toshift to hospitals around the city, while soli-darity also started taking different forms.More and more anonymous people werepresent at the hospitals in order to ensurethat doctors would not act against thehunger strikers will. Instead of remaining inYpatia patrolling outside the mansion ortalking with the migrants and the rest ofthose in solidarity, people stated their avail-abilityindividually, in couples or smallgroupsby accompanying the hunger stri-kers wherever they were transferred. At thesame time, hundreds of anonymous lettersof support, declarations and mobilisations ofsolidarity from across the country and theworld were sent to the hospitals and returnedto Ypatia.26 At this third stage of the hungerstrike its cartography would denote Ypatiaas the centre and the hospitals as the peripheryof the social struggle we are examining.Since the first days at the Law Faculty soli-

darity was challenged through the victimisa-tion of the migrants and the criminalisationof those that brought them here. Seen fromthis perspective, migrants were perceived asvictims of extremist groups that used them inorder to create social unrest and for theirown interests.27 On the eighth day of thehunger strike persecution calls were addressedto six people from the solidarity committeeand the Rector of the University of Athensas guilty of trafficking, transferring of illegalmigrants and occupying the building of theLaw Faculty.28 In the following days, morepersecution calls would come. As Ypatia wascreating its own public space and solidarityunexpectedly occupied new sites all over

Greece and abroad, certain state representa-tives andmedia aimed at criminalising the soli-daritymovement, accusing it of preventing themigrants from eating and leading them todeath.29While at first the site of confrontationwas the building of Ypatia as a whole, at thisstage it moved specifically to the migrantsbodiesand the responsibility over them.Attacks were also made on the migrants

themselves. Their misery was contagious, athreat to public health and the citys purity,a tragedy that transformed the Ypatiamansion into an infection bomb, as statedby the Minister of Health.30 The hunger stri-kers were being conceptualised by the state interms of purity and impurity. There werethose who lived in misery, who couldprovoke unrest, making visible what shouldnot have become so and which could infectthe city and disturb the social fabric. Theycould only be recognised as victims, dirtyand illegal, that had been led by others orwere awaiting deportation.31 Paradoxicallyenough, at the same time media also tried topresent migrants as intentionally provokingsocial unrest, creating an atmosphere of Isla-mophobia. The actions and practices of themigrants are suspicious, subversive anddangerous for the nation. We will repeat itagain and again . . . it is not about peopleimmigrating, it is about a mass movement ofa Muslim population.32

Yet the true case was that those previouslyinvisible had appeared in the public sphereand claimed their space. In the last days ofthe hunger strike, governmental representa-tives entered into direct negotiations withthe hunger strikers. They seemed to recognisethem as subjects whose demands did notsound absurd any longer. The discussion fora new legalisation process opened up at atime when Greece featured in the headlinesof press across Europe only by reference toillegal migration, detention camps, deporta-tions, border patrols and fences that woulddetect and prevent migration to Europe.The hunger strikers managed to reversethese terms and to become visible. On the44th day (9 March) the hunger strike ended.

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The governments decision to meet part of thedemands of the 300 migrants on hunger strikeproves that the only lost struggle is the onethat is not taken on. It also shows to allworking people that the government of theEU, IMF and European Bank Memorandumis not invincible. A strong militant spirit andbroad social solidarity can bring tangibleresults. It is obvious that it will take a longand hard struggle to lift the Apartheidagainst foreign workers living in Greece andEurope. However, there should be no doubtthat the dedication of the 300 opened a newpath of hope.33

Conclusion

On the third day of the hunger strike, 34 uni-versity professors had demanded the lifting ofacademic asylum and the removal of themigrants from the Law Faculty by declaringthe following:

The abuse of the Law Faculty by groups ofany kind, even if we share some of theirdemands, simply cannot go on. Thankfully,due to actions of the State and Rectors, legalitywas maintained, the building was peacefullyevacuated and the migrants were transferredto another place. Humanitarian concern isamong the priorities of our system ofgovernment; however, the total collapse ofdemocratic institutions, including that of thePublic University, is causing harm to the mostvulnerable, the most impotent people of oursociety and the migrants themselves.34

From the Law Faculty, which had seemedlike a place that could bring to the fore all theaspects of a broad mobilisation for a massivehunger strike, migrants were thus transferredto the private mansion of Ypatia, an invisiblespot in the capital that would most probablycondemn them to invisibility. The very essenceof their social struggle, however, managed toovercome the constraints put on them by sucha limiting place, coupled with solidarityactions from within and around the world, amobilisation network that became even more

evident in the hospitals throughout the city,where many of the migrants were subsequentlytransferred. In this sense, therefore, the hungerstrike can be considered to have achieved avictory. Even if its sole demand was not satis-fied, the 300 strikers and those in solidaritymanaged to re-frame Ypatia as a public spaceof social struggle, to become visible and to actas political subjects creating a momentum inthe countrys central political life.Two months later, in May 2011, a racist

pogrom-like action broke out in the centreof Athens under the pretext of the cold-blooded murder of a 44-year-old Greekman as punishment for a minor theft. Thisescalated into a situation where at least onemigrant was stabbed to death and at least 17others injured, mostly from stabbings. Anumber of police officers in the vicinity ofthe events (in the north part of the citycentre of Athens, along the Patision Avenueaxis) were accused of tolerating the attacks,which were carried out largely by membersof the Golden Dawn, the extreme-right pol-itical group now represented in local govern-ment. The question at issue was, once again,not how to cope with the issue of migrationin itself, but to confront the presence of arising number of illegal people in despairdown town and clear the city centre fromtheir unpleasant image.35 In the case of theLaw Faculty, as articulated by the universityprofessors, the question was not whetherthere must be asylum or rule of law, butwho would have access to those valueswithin the context of a democratic country.In the case of the most recent pogroms,the question was who would have the rightto appropriate the capitals landscape.In these times of crisis, therefore, spatiality

keeps emerging as a focal axis around whichissues of identity and citizenship are violentlydebated, but sometimes also meaningfullyre-framed. The 300 migrants and the peoplestanding in solidarity with them demandedtheir political representation and subjectivitythrough bringing to the fore issues and peoplepreviously invisible and creating in siturelationships of community. Within this

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context, the mass hunger strike of 2011 mayserve as an important reference point inre-appropriating spatiality; through theirsocial struggle, these people may havemanaged to re-enact the city and themselves.

Notes

1 Statement of the Assembly of Migrant HungerStrikers on 23 January 2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/01/23/statement-of-the-assembly-of-migrant-hunger-strikers(this URL as well as the following URLs cited in thenotes were last accessed on 15 March 2011).Myrto Anthypatopoulos unpublished dissertationPolitikes gia ti Metanastefsi kai Koinonika KinimataIperaspisis ton Dikaiomaton ton Metanaston. ToParadeigma tis Apergias Peinas ton 300(Migration Politics and Social Movements forMigrants Rights: the case of the 300 MigrantsHunger Strike), March 2011, has been a usefulguide for drafting this chronicle of the strike.

2 Statement of the Minister of the Interior G. Ragousison 25 January 2011, http://www.inews.gr/141/ypes-den-yparchei-kamia-prothesi-mazikis-kai-adiakritis-nomimopoiisis-allodapon.htm

3 Reinforced surveillance of entry by land at theGreekTurkish border and blocking departures byair or sea. Alongside Athens airport, Patras andIgoumenitsa are among the countrys leadingdeparture gates, quoted in Migreurop report200910: European BordersControls,Detention, Deportations, http://www.migreurop.org/IMG/pdf/rapport-migreurop-2010-en_-_2-121110.pdf. Greek state policies are compoundedby European migration policies of emergency thattend to approach migration as a threat.

4 Ksilonontas to Asulo (Tearing Apart the Asylum),Ethnos, http://www.ethnos.gr/article.asp?catid=12197&subid=2&pubid=52416976

5 Aparadekth Praktikh (Unacceptable Practice), TaNea online, 25 January 2011, http://www.tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=1&artid=4614795

6 Epistoli Paremvasis gia ta Gegonota tis Nomikisapo 34 Panepistimiakous (Letter of InterventionConcerning the Law Faculty Incidents Signed by 34University Professors), Ta Nea, 28 January 2011,http://www.tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=1&artid=4615467

7 Ch. Papachristou, Asulo (Asylum), Ta Nea, 25January 2011, http://www.tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=8&artid=4614790

8 Old Boy, Mpikan sto Saloni mas kai Chezoun(They Entered our Living Room and Shat on It), 27January 2011, http://old-boy.blogspot.com/2011/01/blog-post_27.html

9 A. Papahelas, Oi Opadoi ths Vias (Fans ofViolence), Kathimerini, 27 January 2011, http://www.kathimerini.com.cy/index.php?pageaction=kat&modid=1&artid=37156&show=Y

10 Phorum, Ypatia: Idioktitis kai Diaplekomena(Ypatia: The Owner and Interlocking Interests), 18March 2011, http://www.phorum.gr/viewtopic.php?f=52&t=204001

11 Clandestinenglish, The Greek State TorturesHunger Strikers, http://clandestinenglish.wordpress.com/2011/01/30/the-greek-state-tortures-hunger-strikers/; Prwtovoulia Allhlegguhsstous 300 Apergous Metanastes, Deltio Tupou 11hMera Apergias Peinas (Solidarity Assembly to the300 Migrant Strikers, Press Release 11th Day), 4February 2011, http://bit.ly/khoLTG

12 This comment, as well as others to follow, are basedon participant observation.

13 Apofash Suneleushs Apergwn Peinas (Decision ofthe Assembly of the Hunger Strikers), 27 January2011, http://bit.ly/eTH13V

14 Anakoinwsh twn Apergwn Peinas Metanastvn(Statement of the Migrant Hunger Strikers), 5February 2011, http://bit.ly/iVSPK9

15 M. Thermou, Ena Palataki Gia Tous Metanastes (ASmall Palace for the Migrants), To Vima, 30 January2011, http://www.tovima.gr/politics/article/?aid=381278

16 For the trade unions that supported the hunger strikesee: http://bit.ly/jh5l2C; for the migrantcommunities and antiracist groups see: http://bit.ly/m8rBKk; for artists see: http://bit.ly/mptvvZ; forstudent unions see: http://bit.ly/jVaq7n; forpolitical groups and organisations see: http://bit.ly/iqDgHA

17 For local councils and groups that supported thehunger strike see: http://bit.ly/l1HwgS; PsifismaDhmotikou Sumvouliou Thessalonikhs (Resolutionof the Local Council of Thessaloniki), 17 February2011, http://bit.ly/iLxdJW

18 For Association of TranslatorsEditorsProofreaders, Solidarity with the Struggle of theMigrants, 4 February 2011, http://www.smed.gr/2011/02/solidarity-with-struggle-of-migrants.html

19 For solidarity from abroad see: http://bit.ly/ifjZ9D20 Slavoj Zizek, 18 February 2011, http://

hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/02/18/slavoj-zizek-douzinas/

21 For actions of solidarity see: http://bit.ly/iJctJO, forexample, Call for a European CoordinatedSolidarity Action for the 300 Migrants HungerStrikers in Greece on Monday, March 7, 3 March2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/03/03/european-day-solidarity-actions/;Drash Allhleguhs sto Berolino (Action of Solidarityin Berlin), 8 March 2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/03/08/drash-allhlegguhs-berolino/; for an exhaustive reference of actions of

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solidarity see: Diadrastikos Xarths ekdhlwsewnAllhlegguhs (Interactive Map of Actions ofSolidarity), http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/02/14/map/

22 See Medical Report, 25 February, http://bit.ly/inMXN9 and Statement of the Solidarity Initiative atthe press conference on 18 February, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/02/18/press-conference-of-solidarity-initiative-for-the-300-migrant-hunger-strikers-18-2/

23 98 Migrants Hunger Strikers to Hospital,Demonstration in Solidarity, Friday 4 March,Solidarity Initiative to the 300 Hunger Strikers,http://bit.ly/gUxpck

24 Se Nosokomeia Perissoteroi apo 100 MetanastesApergoi Peinas (More than 100 MigrantsTransferred to Hospital), Eleftherotypia, 8 March2011, http://www.enet.gr/?i=news.el.article&id=257438

25 Statement made by the President and Vice-Presidentof the Pan Hellenic Medical Organization on 5March 2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/03/05/anakoinosi-proedrou-antiproedrou-iatrikou-syllogou/

26 More than 100 emails by individuals from all overthe world reached the following addressypografes.allilegyi.stin.apergia@gmail.comexpressing their solidarity with the hunger strikers inthe hospitals (from 25 February to 9 March 2011).

27 Domestic groups and little extreme groupings thatdogmatize either on the left or on the right exploitthis situation so as to create a confrontationalclimate and they think that this way they create amigrant movement . . . and they hope they willachieve also other things by feeding hate anddebate. But it would be better not to challenge, asthey are now doing occupying the Faculty of Law . . .they will the first to lose if control is lost, Ant.Karakousis, I Proklisi tis Nomikis (The Challenge ofFaculty of Law), To Vima, http://www.tovima.gr/opinions/article/?aid=380446

28 Ston Eisaggelea gia tin Ypothesi tis Nomikis (To theAttorney General Concerning the Issue of theFaculty of Law), 3 February 2011, http://www.real.gr/DefaultArthro.aspx?page=arthro&id=43885&catID=3

29 See, for instance, Sinefthisan dio Simparastates(Two Persons in Solidarity were Arrested), Ethnos,8 March, http://www.ethnos.gr/article.asp?catid=11424&subid=2&pubid=56698950

30 Statement made by the Minister of Health,

Andreas Loverdos, 14 February 2011, http://bit.ly/irOvh8

31 At the same time, during a discussion at themunicipal council on 23 February the mayor ofAthens proposed a resolution according to whichmigrants were asked to stop their hunger strike inorder to enter into dialogue. It is interesting to notethe fact that in introducing the issue, the mayorreferred to recent incidents of hooliganism, clearlyimplying that the hunger strike was also an episodeof social unrest. The resolution was not finallyapproved. See extracts http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amxgT7DQPZ4

32 Skai TV news, 4 March 2011, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYzRTvhZmKc&feature=player_embedded#at=192

33 Statement of the Solidarity Initiative, 9 March2011, http://hungerstrike300.espivblogs.net/2011/03/09/the-vindication-of-the-300-migrants-hunger-strikers-is-a-hope-for-the-whole-society/

34 Epistoli Paremvasis gia ta Gegonota tis Nomikisapo 34 Panepistimiakous (Letter of InterventionConcerning the Law Faculty Incidents Signed by 34University Professors), Ta Nea, 28 January 2011,http://www.tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=1&artid=4615467

35 Michalis Katsigeras, Ektos politevmatos (Beyondthe Regime), Kathimerini, 11 May 2011, http://news.kathimerini.gr/4dcgi/_w_articles_ell_1_11/05/2011_441739; Pretenteris Giannis, MasPiran tin Athina (They took from us Athens), TaNea,11 May 2011, http://www.tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=2&ct=136&artid=4630465;G. Pouliopoulos, Prosopa kai Tragodies sto Kentrotou Fovou. Ena western DiadramatizetaiKathimerina sto Kentro tis Athinas (People andTragedies in the Centre of Fear. A Western is DailyTaking Place in the Centre of Athens), To Vima, 15May 2011, http://www.tovima.gr/politics/article/?aid=400685

Regina Mantanika, PhD candidate, Depart-ment of Social Science, University Paris7. Email: reginamanta@yahoo.com

Hara Kouki, PhD candidate, School of Law,Birkbeck College, University of London.Email: harakouki@gmail.com

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