Incidents of migrants stabbed on the streets or at public transport means have increased during the last days, with the latest two attacks to have taken place within 20 minutes. One man from Albania and two men from Poland fell victims to what it seems to have been ‘racist attacks’.
Eyewitness describe the incredible attack that took place on Thursday night at Neos Kosmos district of southern Athens.
The first victim was an Albanian man who was penetrated with a …sword by attackers on motorcycles outside the elementary school of the area.
“We heard the groans of the man” eyewitnesses told news portal Newsit. “He was just being hit, he was still standing on his feet. The blade had penetrated the man form the back to the chest. The poor guy was in a state of shock. He collapsed within minutes.”
They spoke of “2-3 people on motorcycles” that immediately left after the attack.
The victim is hospitalized in critical condition.
The man from Albania has been living in the area with his family and is icons painter. He has been in Greece since 17 years.
It is not clear whether the attackers had been lurking for their victim.
Twenty minutes later after the attack and some three kilometers away, two migrants from Poland were attacked with knives. They are also hospitalized but were not able to testify to the police yet.
Last Tuesday, a man from Bangladesh was stabbed by an attacker who was holding a knife inside the Athens Metro in Omonia Square. The attacker managed to flee.
On Monday, a man from Pakistan collapsed at the platform of the Urban Train <Agios Nikolaos> station after he was stabbed.
When the workers at the urban train HSAP issued a statement citing eyewitnesses and blaming extreme-right Chrysi Avgi for the attack, Golden Dawn declared it had nothing to do with the incident, urged to stop ‘the war of throwing mud’ and threatened ‘to file complaints against those claiming the party is responsible for attacks against migrants’ without providing convincing evidence to the police. ( ERTonline and ekathimerini)
PS a neighbor from Albania was telling me that recently a group of youth (17-20) approached a group of (Albanian) children (12-14) hanging out at the park. They started shouting “Who is Albanian? Who is a foreigner here?”. The youngsters, who were born in Greece and speak the language without accent shouted back “No Albanian here, we are all Greeks!” The youth group left and the children rushed homes. Among the children was the 14-year-old boy of the neighbor…
If Greeks attack foreigners, who will travel to Greece?
Attacking foreigners will make Greece economy worse.
Blame yourself and your politicians who spent more than earnings.
Do not blame and attack innocent foreigners, we are all same human being.
blame me???
Thank you for publishing this. What alarms me is that any foreigner can be attacked. Whether Poland, Albanian, Pakistani, these portray the colors of man (white, black, etc) and so no one is safe. Will it take an American or British tourist to be mistakenly attacked to push the authorities to get serious about this? In the USA, i remember a similar incident and within a few hours, every channel had the video footage of the attackers on every news report and someone recognized the attackers and they were arrested. I have yet to even see Greek news reporting on it, so thank you KTG.
Any party that condones violence against any segment of the population should be illegal. Promoting racial hatred should also be a crime and Hrissi Avgi should be banned from participating in the parliament if they advocate for physical attacks against any person in a democratic state, directly or indirectly. Dialogue is one thing, promoting crimes is another.
One encouraging thing is that their support rates have been falling steadily in the polls.
That being said, we don’t know who were the people that stabbed the immigrants. Because, during these times of uncertainty, vested intrest groups may derive benefits from destabilizing the Greek society.
Personally, I support the welfare of all immigrants in Greece and I think that the problem lies with the state not having provided a legal framework for the new immigrants so they can be integrated into the Greek society in equal terms with the Greeks (work under the same terms, pay taxes, etc). Also, the EU need to acknowledge the refugee problem and aid Greece in dealing with the rising number of immigrants that come to Greece to escape oppressive regimes and see Greece as a doorway to Europe.
Well said Rum! I totally agree. The only thing mentioned on these posts which is untrue is that UK newspapers and magazines are asking the Brits to go to Greece for holidays to help Greece’s economy. That’s just bullshit.