Conditional release imposes the well-known restrictions: Presence at the police station and a ban on leaving the country until the end of the sentence. This is a normal procedure. However, what the state reserves for the cases of prisoners convicted under 187A, the well-known “anti-terrorism” law, is the subjection of everyone to the control and restrictions of an authority that was also established in Greece following a European directive.
This is the Anti-Money Laundering Authority, Section B (from now on in the text I will refer to it as an Authority) which is headed by prosecutors. Based on Article 50 of Law 4557/2018, everyone who has been convicted of dynamic-armed forms of resistance, that is, for “terrorism” according to state phraseology and legislation, has no right over any asset in their possession, whether it concerns bank accounts or real estate or anything else, since everything is frozen by the Authority.
In order for someone to open a bank account (at a time when every economic activity is now required to pass through the control of banks), e.g. for payroll or for an allowance, one must apply to the Authority, which will approve the use of a single account for this reason alone. However, as far as other assets are concerned, it is obliged to apply to the Authority for the partial release of some assets and the Authority will only accept it if it considers that this is absolutely necessary. And as is always the case, the Authority gives negative answers. That is, someone with a house that he has inherited from his parents, cannot transfer it to his child, rent it or sell it since the Authority prohibits it, even if he has a significant problem of survival.
So while one would expect this Authority to deal with what its name declares, that is, to control the origin of the assets and income of a person convicted under 187A, its work extends to any property of legal origin that binds it and prohibits any use of it forever.
My case is one of those cases that face this problem and will face it for the rest of their lives. In the case of those convicted under 187 (“criminal organization”) there is a possibility to get out of this situation, in the case of those convicted under 187A, no. This is a serious element that confirms once again that for the state in the hierarchy of violators of the state legal framework, the first place is held by those who chose the path of armed revolutionary action. Even in the face of heinous and deeply antisocial crimes, armed political resistance to the regime is met with the utmost vindictiveness.
I was informed of the new hostage condition imposed by the Authority, when I attempted, shortly after my release from prison in November 2023, to get the allowance for released prisoners. Upon application to the Authority, I was able to obtain it, as well as I was able to use a bank account for payroll and for the unemployment benefit I am currently receiving. At the same time, I applied to be able to use for livelihood an asset that came into my possession after the death of a relative, since with a basic salary or with an unemployment benefit it is impossible to support ourselves, as one member of the family, my son, is a minor and another member is in prison, my comrade Nikos Maziotis who the state is denying the release to which he is entitled, as he has rejected seven applications for release and is about to finally serve his entire sentence (a unique case for political prisoners and for prisoners in general).
But it is not only the problem of livelihood, as after my release from prison the debts that the state demands me to pay were presented and concern trials that have been made for the Revolutionary Struggle and financial penalties that have been imposed on us. The amounts are dizzying. In total, at the moment, the debt from the courts exceeds 27,000 euros. Initially, the fines they imposed were 11,000 euros. With an increase of 110% imposed with the declaration of the amount, it reached 23,100 euros, which after eight months exceeded the amount of 25,000 euros. Court costs and fines reach 2000 euros. Because the Authority prohibited me from using any assets due to a freeze, I found myself unable to pay the inheritance tax, which is now at 9,000 euros. That is, the total debt – and since the authority forbids me to use any inherited asset – exceeds 36,000 euros and is increasing at an inconceivable rate.
As provided, after an amount or more, criminal prosecution is brought for debts to the state where the penalty is not avoided and imprisonment is not excluded. That is, I will again face the prospect of going to prison again, this time for debts to the state, because the Authority has paved the way to this end.
Debts and the Authority have now built a financial noose. This is a new hostage condition that is consciously imposed by the state to create a state of suffocation around every aspect of my life and, above all, my son’s life, since he is the direct recipient of this whole condition. Prospectively, and since there is a complete inability to repay even a part of these debts, the threat of a possible new imprisonment is visible in the next few years. If this is not a plan of political revenge, then what is?
It’s not enough that I stayed in state prisons for eight years and six months, it’s not enough that the courts have imposed these fines and debts on me, the Authority comes and prohibits any use of assets while knowing everything about my financial situation. It prohibits the use of these assets for livelihood purposes, knowing that this decision of hers is, in principle, against the interests of a minor teenager. Knowing how the “best interests of the child” are prioritized above the restrictions imposed by the state legal framework. Because, in this case, it depends on whose child it is, as we saw in the past with my arrest in 2017 and the exceptional-criminal treatment reserved for him by the state (detention in GADA, interrogation by DAEEB, confinement in a closed psychiatric ward for days under police guard, with the explicit prosecutor’s order to do all this under extreme secrecy, a ban on contacting relatives and his release after a hunger and thirst strike with my partner Nikos Maziotis).
Obviously, Revolutionary Struggle with its political activity and my political stance for so many years in the courts and prisons is estimated by some state employees to have to suffer a new type of life sentence, with the Authority becoming the new body of judicial political revenge. I made a new application to the Authority these days asking to be allowed to use the inherited assets to repay part of the debts that burden me, since only through this way can I reduce the exorbitant debt. In case of refusal, they are not going to get a single euro, since not a single euro is left over.
Instead of being able to use these assets for the care of my son, for his life, for his education, his survival, his health, I now ask to use them to reduce a debt, which is in itself a highly vindictive condition.
When the entire social base is crushed under the economic violence of the state and capital, when conquests of many decades are thrown into the baskets of historical waste, such as the eight-hour day, won through bloody struggles, when wages and pensions are not enough to cover basic survival needs, when housing becomes a luxury item so as not to harm the interests of a few who speculate in various ways with it, When quality and adequate food becomes a condition for a few, access to health and effective care becomes a privilege for the rich, when the majority is exterminated every day and slowly disappears, then we are talking about a universal hostage condition. But the dynamic political opponents of the regime in power, in addition to the long prison sentences imposed on them, from the moment they pass… outside the prison gate, have been sentenced for life to live in an even more suffocating, within the universal and for the entire social base, hostage. In a hostage within the hostage. The hostage of a well-planned and without any way out of economic, and therefore social suffocation that comes from the absolute and indisputable power of the Authority. This plan of vengeful extermination must be stopped.
Pola Roupa
14/9/2025