Sir Hugh and Greece
Sir: Having recently returned from Athens where, as a special consultant to the government, he helped Greek radio and television as an asphyxiating state enterprise at the expense of independent thought and expression in the country (only the Greek government can now broadcast to the Greek People), Sir Hugh Greene strikes a painfully discordant note as he suddenly struggles to sound 'liberal' in the aftermath of it all (27 March). He is, therefore, best ignored— with a difference. The opportunity, I mean, Should not be missed to expose yet more relevant truths about Greece today.
But first a word about his assertion that Eleftheros Kosmos, 'the newspaper which was the most ardent champion of the junta, IS where Professor Devletoglou's views most often appear.' This is untrue. And an exhead of the British Broadcasting Corporation should not have been capable of such an untruth. Eleftheros Kosmos, interestingly enough, did not even mention my article under discussion in the Spectator (13 March), as opposed, to other liberal newsPapers, such as Atknaiki (15 March) and Eleftherotypia (15 -March), which carried the article on their front and leader pages, respectively. In fact, out of some thirty articles from me on Greek affairs, since Mr Karamanlis's return to power, only one appeared in Eleftheros Kosmos—in order to Protest, at that, against the Greek government's violation of the freedom of the press When it chose to prosecute that newspaper for its political views. Curiously, the exhead of the BBC seems also unaware that I had earlier selected the leading communist newspaper in Greece, Avgi, to argue in a specially commissioned article that Mr Karamanlis's inherently illiberal accession to power could have tragic results if left unchecked—a point of view directly echoed in my analysis in the Spectator and in the New Statesman (11 July 1975) to which Sir Hugh apparently refers.
In a nutshell, and alas sadly, Mr Karamarilis has hijacked Greece to the left. For, having at no time put before the Greek People the slightest warning, he, as a 'known ozimservatiVe', is now turning Greece socialist. A few examples suffice: 1. The Association of Greek Industrialists (the equivalent to the CBI in this country), appealed a fortnight ago to the Government for an explanation why 'the social democratic ideal is suddenly enforced upon the Greek people without any popular mandate whatsoever'. 2. In a speech to the governors of leading Greek banks in February 1976, Mr Karamanlis stated, 'We often apply policies that are even more progressive than those in many other countries in the West where socialist parties are in power'.
3. In an interview granted last year to Athens newspapers, Mr George Rallis, Minister of the Prime Minister's Office and Education, announced that `Mr Karamanlis has been a socialist for years. His thinking deeply bears the stamp of socialism.'
4. In early February this year officers of the Greek Army were present as observers during military manoeuvres in the Soviet Union which took place in the Caucasus.
5. Between July 1974 and mid-January 1976, 3,200 communists returned to Greece from behind the Iron Curtain where they had been living since leaving Greece after the Civil War. Long-standing charges of treason and criminal activity against them have been dropped.
6. The Balkan conference, initiated by Mr Karamanlis in evident harmony with Russian policy in the Balkans, was brought to a successful conclusion in Athens in early February, and was preceded by the installation of two anchorages by the Soviet navy east and west of the island of Crete.
Finally, consider Sir Hugh's incredible .statement that the relative freedom from labour unrest that Greece now enjoys might be a matter of envy for other European countries. May I ask how can it be that he is unaware of strikes in Greece by school teachers, doctors, transport and a variety of telecommunications, banking, electricity board, manufacturing and construction workers?
Nicos Devletoglou
27 Herodotou St, Athens 136, Greece
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