Upon learning that the ship would dock at Piraeus, ENEDEP announced it would not allow the unloading of war material destined for the Gaza Strip. They called for a mobilisation on Saturday at noon to enforce this decision.
“This development is one of the most important victories in our ten years of syndicalist struggle,” the ENEDEP union stated, highlighting the significance of their action. They also called on Italian dockworkers to follow their lead, asserting, “The dockworkers of the world stand united, in solidarity with Palestine until it is free.”
The Communist Party of Greece (KKE) supported this action by staging a broad strike and intervention at Pier I of the Piraeus Port Authority (PPA) this morning. The KKE members endorsed the dockworkers’ stance against unloading the war material intended for Israel.
The Party’s members distributed an announcement from the Piraeus Sectoral Organisation, which stated, “This ship, after being unable to dock at the port of Barcelona, set sail for Pier I of the PPA. However, the spirited stance of the dockworkers has thwarted the US-NATO plans and those of the Greek government, which increasingly entangles us in US-NATO schemes, whether by facilitating NATO’s killing machine or by sending military material and personnel to conflict zones.”
Key figures present at the intervention included Nikos Ambatielos, a member of the central committee and Member of Parliament for A’ Piraeus; Petros Markomihalis, a member of the central committee and secretary of the Transport Office of the Attica Cooperative; George Kalamaras, a member of the Attica Regional Committee of the KKE and Deputy Secretary General of the Piraeus Labour Centre; and Sotiris Poulikogiannis, president of the Metal Syndicate of Attica and the Shipbuilding Industry of Greece.
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