Greece: The cost of indifference
Mohammad Hassan from Corith’s camp dies
KEERFA accuses Minister Dendias
Afghani refugee Mohammad Hassan died on Saturday in Sismanogleio hospital where he was intubated struggling to stay alive after moved there from Corinth’s hospital where he entered on the 2nd of July. He had been prisoned in Corinth’s concentration camp since 2/9/2012. KEERFA accused the ministry of Public Order for indifference and complicity.
“The Afghan refugee prisoner from Corinth’s [Korinthos’s] concentration camp that was kept dying and intubated in Sismanoglio is dead. Samara’s Government and Minister of Citizen Protection Dendias have stained their hands with blood” notes KEERFA, who made the incident public with their announcement.
As KEERFA [he Movement Against Racism and the Fascist Threat] had warned through their announcement and an interview on Thursday publised on enet, his life had been in danger.
According to allegations from his fellow prisoners, he had been experiencing pain for a long time but the policemen were refusing to respond to his plea to be taken to the hospital. He had an infection requiring prompt treatment.
“We reached this point because even the warnings from OENGE (the Federation of Hospital Doctors) a month ago when they visited Amygdaleza camp were ignored. The Ministry of Public Order and the Greek Police have did absolutely nothing.
Prisoners die and Dendias remains silent. For us there is complicity of the Ministry of Citizen Protection and Dendias in the crimes taking place in the camps and in police station, like the Grevena one. […]
People looking for asylum and safety are arrested, imprisoned and led to death. There has to be an end to this policy right now.
A big protest by his fellow prisoners had to take place for Mohammad Hassan to be eventually taken to the hospital.
Unfortunately, it was proven that it was already late. What makes it even more tragic is that on the 8th of July, while he was intubated in Sismanogleio, he was given a paper suspending for six months the decision that got him detained and waiting for his deportation.
It is a paper with the story of a refugee, victim of Dendias’s ‘sweep’ operation that starts with his detention in september 2012, continues with his arrest and imprisonment in Corinth a week after and ends with his release on the 8th of July 2013 after he was taken to the hospital on the 2nd of July. The conclusion is that the only possible ways to exit the camp is to either commit suicide or to be dying because of lack of medical care”
It adds:
“His fellow detainees had started a strong collective protest because Mohammad Hassan was experiencing unbearable pain, he was asking to be seen by a doctor and the policemen were ignoring him. The medical report written by the doctors in Corinth says “‘respiratory infection – respiratory failure type 1″.
It is known from witnesses that Mohammad Hassan had been for 11 months without even the basic treatment for his serious infection that led to his death.
Mohammad Hassan’s death is a premeditated racist crime. OENGE’s doctors had warned after visiting Amygdaleza about the dangers of depriving detainees of the basic medical care. KEERFA had repeatedly complained about the conditions in Dendias’s concentration camps, the last time being in the interview given jointly with the Community of Afghani Immigrants and Refugees in Greece, in which we warned about Mohammad Hassan’s state of health.
We demand the immediate closure of the concentration camps that lead immigrants to extermination.
We demand the careful investigation of the case and the punishment of the perpetrators of this murder. The responsibilities of the Ministry of Public Order as well as those of the Greek Police should not be concealed”.
Translated by „I can’t relax in Greece“ ( http://icantrelaxingreece.wordpress.com/2013/07/28/the-…ence/) from „Enet.gr“ (http://www.enet.gr/?i=news.el.ellada&id=377290) newspaper, 27/07/2013