Definitive Report - Report No 98, 1967

Case No 453 (Greece) - Complaint date: 26-AUG-65 - Closed

64. The Committee examined this case at its 42nd Session held in February 1966. On that occasion the Committee submitted an interim report containing a number of conclusions and a request for additional information from the Government; that report was approved by the Governing Body at its 164th Session (February-March 1966).

1. 64. The Committee examined this case at its 42nd Session held in February 1966. On that occasion the Committee submitted an interim report containing a number of conclusions and a request for additional information from the Government; that report was approved by the Governing Body at its 164th Session (February-March 1966).

A. A. The complainants' allegations

1. 65. Essentially, the complaints allege that, on the occasion of a meeting followed by a procession on 19 August 1965 in Athens, four leaders of the Greek Federation of Press Employees were arrested. They were Messrs. Nicolas Katlas, President, Anasthase Dimou, General Secretary, Jean Papayianneas, Administrative Secretary, and Antoine Gerolymatos, member of the Executive Council.
2. 66. Observing from the Government's reply that penal proceedings had been initiated to establish liability in the case a the Committee, at its February 1966 session, had recommended the Governing Body to request the Government to be good enough to inform it of the results of those proceedings and of the present situation with regard to the four trade union leaders named in the complaints.
3. 67. This request for information having been conveyed to the Government in a letter dated 2 March 1966, the Government replied by a communication dated 16 August 1966, which was brought to the Committee's attention at its 44th Session in November 1966.
4. 68. From that reply, to which was joined a certificate issued by the court of first instance of Athens, it appears that Messrs. Katlas, Dimou and Papayianneas were sentenced by the court of first instance of Athens to two years' imprisonment for incitement to seditious offences by virtue of Ruling No. 13563/66. Mr. Gerolymatos, who was charged with the same offence, was acquitted by virtue of the same ruling. The document supplied by the court of first instance of Athens shows that the three defendants appealed against the ruling of that court.
5. 69. At its session held in November 1966 the Committee noted that since the date of the Government's reply the press had reported a ruling of the court of second instance reducing Mr. Dimou's and Mr. Papayianneas's prison sentence to one year (the offence in these two cases being incitement to sedition and resistance to the authorities). The press cutting available to the Committee does not allude to the ruling concerning Mr. Katlas.
6. 70. In view of these new elements the Committee instructed the Director-General, at its session held in November 1966, to request the Government to be good enough to supply the text of the ruling of the court of second instance concerning Messrs. Katlas, Dimou and Papayianneas.
7. 71. That request having been made to the Government by a letter dated 11 November 1966, the Government replied by a communication dated 31 January 1967.
8. 72. From the ruling of the Court of Appeal of Athens (5047/66), the text of which was attached to the Government's reply, it appears first of all that Mr. Katlas was found not guilty of the charges against him (incitement to sedition and resistance to the authorities).
9. 73. With regard to Mr. Dimou and Mr. Papayianneas, they were found guilty and sentenced to one year's imprisonment each, the sentence being commuted to a fine in the case of Mr. Papayianneas.
10. 74. The grounds adduced by the court for its ruling were that on 20 August 1965 the persons concerned knowingly and deliberately incited the public to sedition on the occasion of a meeting, followed by a march in procession (which had been forbidden), shouting political slogans against the Prime Minister and his Government; the procession degenerated into a mob demonstration, the participants violently resisting the police, who attempted to disperse them after the usual warnings. The court therefore considered that as the persons charged had refrained from urging the demonstrators to disperse, they were at least partly responsible for the acts of violence that followed (stones and other objects were thrown and blows dealt with blunt instruments, many people being injured on both sides).
11. 75. In view of the slogans shouted by the demonstrators, some of which the court quotes, and in view of the turn taken by the demonstration, it would seem that the charges brought against the persons in question, who were tried as being the instigators of the events described above, must be considered as having an essentially political nature and in any case as exceeding the bounds of normal trade union activities.

The Committee's recommendations

1. 76. In these circumstances, in view on the one hand of the acquittal of Mr. Gerolymatos by the court of first instance and Mr. Katlas by the appellate court and, on the other hand, the fact that the actions with which Mr. Dimou and Mr. Papayianneas are charged appear to be effectively unconnected with trade union activities, the Committee, noting that the persons concerned were covered by the safeguards provided by national judicial procedure, considers that the complainants have not supplied proof of violation of freedom of association in this particular case and consequently recommends the Governing Body to decide that the case does not call for further examination.