My
last article was about Turkey… now it’s about Greece.
It seems like an
Eastern Europe human rights violations “journey” is happening often
these days, with agressive acts by the police in Turkey, LGBTQI rights
violations in Russia and now Greece.
A journey that’s not very happy
indeed.
So now in Greece there is a new Health Minister named Adonis
Georgiadis.
Currently, a new Health Minister has been named in Greece:
Adonis
Georgiadis was a member of the previous nationalistic party that entered
the Greek Parliament, LAOS.
When they lost their position in the
Parliament during the last elections he and another congressman, Makis
Voridis, moved to New Democracy and with the last reformation, after
some moves Adonis Georgiadis became Health Minister.
In May 2012, the previous Health Minister, Andreas Loverdos came up
with a Ministerial Decision stating the police has the right to arrest
people to force them in HIV/AIDS tests (if needed) and that police may
also publish the personal data of arrested people with HIV.
That decision results in 17 women being arrested, in May of 2012 and
found HIV positive.
What followed was the police that made their
personal data public through the media and the Greek Police website,
because of “public health” protection.
Those women were mostly
prostitutes and drug addicts BUT their clients paid more for unprotected
sex, which led them to be found HIV positive.
Although Greek court of
law decided they were innocent regarding their connection with sex
industry because there wasn’t any proof, the lives of those women and
the ones of their families were already destroyed.
Although it was soon abolished by the former sub-minister, Fotini
Skopouli, the current Health Minister, Adonis Georgiadis brought it back
on the news with the same excuse: the protection of public health!
After that decision has been reintroduced, many local LGBTQI and
HIV/AIDS NGOs raised their voices.
On July 3rd, in Thessaloniki, the
LGBTQI youth organization Good As You(th)
Thessaloniki protested,
followed on Monday July 8th by others Greek NGOs outside the Ministry of
Health, in Athens.
This measure didn’t leave the international community speechless.
Among the several reactions, the French HIV expert and Medicine
Nobelist Françoise Barré – Sinoussi stated in her closing speech of IAS
(International AIDS Society) at Kuala Lumpur:
“As we keep repeating over the years, there will be no end to the HIV epidemic without advancing Human rights in parallel”, and asked Greek Government to withdraw the decision immediately.
On the opposite, Minister of Justice, Transparency and Human Rights,
Charalampos Athanassiou, didn’t say a word about the reintroduction of
the decision, nor the Secretary of Transparency and Human Rights Sourlas
Georgios.
Nevertheless we would like to remind them the International
Declaration of Human Rights Greece as part of the EU, Greece as an UN
Charter signatory, Greece as a democratic country has to follow its
duties and serve human rights.
Article 5: No one is allowed to submit in torture, penalty or violent, inhuman and/or degrading treatment.
Mandatory HIV tests are a use of violence.
Also when the personal
data become public it is a pillory of those people which is an inhumane
treatment.
Article 12: No one is allowed to suffer arbitrary interventions in
their private life, family, home and mail, neither attack in their honor
and reputation.
Anyone has the right to be protected by the law from
interpretations and that kind of insults.
When someone is sick it is their right to tell people or not.
If the
police does it, it’s a clearly violation of that right because the
police intervenes in their private life.
That right too is protected by
the Greek Constitution.
Written by Amorgianou Dimitra, member of the Human Rights Working Group
Pictures are courtesy of Hiro Photography
from ACT-UP:
Δευτέρα, 1 Ιουλίου 2013
ΠΛΗΡΗΣ ΕΠΑΝΑΦΟΡΑ ΤΗΣ Υ.Δ. 39Α ΤΟΥ ΛΟΒΕΡ-DOS/ Ο Φασισμός δεν έφυγε ποτέ
Τετάρτη, 3 Ιουλίου 2013
ΚΟΙΝΟ ΔΕΛΤΙΟ ΤΥΠΟΥ ΓΙΑ ΤΗΝ ΕΠΑΝΑΦΟΡΑ ΣΕ ΙΣΧΥ ΤΗΣ ΥΓΕΙΟΝΟΜΙΚΗΣ ΔΙΑΤΑΞΗΣ 39Α http://actupathens.blogspot.gr/2013/07/39_3.html
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