Protests stop Powell visit to Olympics
It's not only New York where the Bush administration is
running into confrontations with angry people.
On Aug. 28, Secretary of State Colin Powell was scheduled to
visit Athens, Greece. He had two major duties there. One was to
make a splash as a guest of honor at the Olympics. The other
was to arm-twist the Greek government into putting some support
behind the U.S. occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.
On the evening of Aug. 27, thousands of people called out by
the Stop the War Coalition and other anti-war forces marched
into downtown Athens toward the U.S. Embassy. Attacked by a
heavy contingent of police using tear gas, the demonstrators
nevertheless fought and held their ground for four hours.
They were cheered on by "thousands of bystanders, Greeks and
foreign visitors for the Olympic Games, who applauded and
participated in condemning the U.S. crimes in Iraq," according
to organizers.
For the next day, the Communist Party of Greece (KKE)
announced another protest and hung a giant sign from the
Parthenon that read, "Powell, killer, go home." The KKE leaflet
noted that "Colin Powell visits Athens in a moment when the
U.S. along with its allies slaughter the Iraqi people, while at
the same time the U.S. is backing the Israeli atrocities
against the Palestinian people."
Powell got the message. The next day, the State Department
announced that the secretary had "urgent responsibilities" and
had to cancel his visit.
--John Catalinotto
Reprinted from the Sept. 9, 2004, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
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