The class unions of Greece, the Federation of Women of Greece (OGE), students unions and peoples’ organizations held militant actions in many cities all over Greece in honor of March 8, International Working Women’s Day for the rights of working women, against imperialist war.

PHOTOS

Athens https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjzF7pK

Other cities https://flic.kr/s/aHBqjzF95x

In Athens massive rally took place in front of the Parliament, where the President of the Union of Bank Employees of Athens, Efi Haliou, noted

“The women of the working class, the workers from all sectors, the women of the popular families, the trade unions and the whole labor movement as a whole celebrate today in a militant and class way for equality and emancipation of women.

We are here, a few days after the big rally on February 26, continuing our struggle against exploitation, against the imperialist war and inflation. We take a clear stand against the new massacre that broke out in Ukraine; we do not choose one criminal from the other. We are with the peoples, with peace and brotherhood, against class exploitation and imperialist war.

Those responsible for this new war that is bleeding the people of Ukraine today, yesterday of Yugoslavia, Palestine, Iran, Syria, and Cyprus are the ones who are responsible for the daily war we live in our lives and our rights. It is the big capital, the imperialist powers US and Russia, the imperialist alliances of NATO and the EU.

They are the ones who, when the first shot fired, took their luxury jets and fled for other places with their chests full, at the same time that the people of Ukraine, like all the peoples of the region, are counting hundreds of dead, wounded and thousands refugees.

These new sad images that tighten the heart of every worker, man or woman, complete the hard daily life we have lived for so many years with our own war that has been declared to us by employers and their governments all these years.

Today we are living with layoffs, flexible working hours, starvation wages, the bone-crushing inflation in electricity and gas bills. When oil, according to the rulers and their parrots, is a proof of wealth and a privilege only for those who have their pockets full. With the prices in the supermarket for the supply of the necessities for our family to have turned into a great torment.

And they are not the only ones! We are already paying a heavy price for the cost of the armaments. Billions of euros of the country’s state budget are being spent on military equipment, at a time when our salaries are falling, hospitals and schools are collapsing and failing to meet our needs for public health and education.

It is not enough for the people to pay with our sweat for their profits. They also want warm blood! They sacrifice the lives of the workers and the entire people of Ukraine and Russia in the meat machine of their profits.

The government of our country with the direct involvement of Greece in this war endangers our own lives! The utilization of the territories of our country, of the American-NATO bases and of our ports turns us into a target!

The trade unions are drawing our own line and fighting against the various calls for “national unity” and “solidarity”. The most crucial issue at the moment, what must prevail for the workers and the unions is the demand that OUR COUNTRY NOW TO DISENGANGE FROM THIS WAR. No participation of Greece. No facility, no infrastructure of the country to be used for their wars…

…In the face of the great battles we have, we break fear, no waiting, no to the dangerous logic of “now is not the time for claims”. In the face of the nationwide strike on April 6, we are preparing for a big confrontation with the Government and the employers. We put at the center of the struggle all the immediate issues for the protection of life, health and the rights of the people.

With the strike escalation we continue the important struggles that took place in the previous period, we strengthen the hubs of resistance in LARCO, COSCO, “Kavala Oil”, the builders, teachers, in the places that are in the battle for a collective contract and elsewhere.

The power is in the hands of the workers. We do not expect solution “experts”, government messiahs who will protect the security, the prosperity of our lives. …

The Greek people, the workers and the women of our class will not accept any sacrifice in our rights for the interests and the competitions of capital. Our strength lies in organization and struggle. As the heroines of our class taught us, as the working class itself taught us in its struggle to abolish the exploitation of man by man.

Long live March 8th. Long live the struggle for equality and the emancipation of women. We continue on the path of class struggle until victory.”