An open letter calling for rigorous judicial and police examinations for the attribution of responsibility for the murderous barbarity, which cost the life of Jacques Kostopoulos is co-signed by 8 MEPs from three political groups (Left, Socialists, Greens), members of the Progressive Caucus’s Steering Committee.
Read below:
‘On September 21, 2018, we witnessed a wild assassination that shook the Greek society: the murder of Jacques Kostopoulos, a young activist fighting for the rights of the LGBTQI people, who suffered a deadly attack from the owner of a jewellery shop in the centre of Athens, and another citizen who participated in this barbarity.
The videos about this murder provoke the public feeling on justice and law, and prove a violation of human rights, due to the behaviour of the police, who even contributed to the transfer of Jacques to the hospital with handcuffs. According to the Ambulance Bulletin, the young man was arrested without breath and consciousness. His transfer to the hospital with the handcuffs is an insult towards a person who is dead, according to the association of hospital doctors.
Unfortunately, the incident of the murder of Jacques Kostopoulos is yet another case of barbarism and racism, which threaten EU societies and the historical European construction itself. Ideas and practices that circumvent any concept of the rule of law, the logic of “justice, order and security” itself, taking law into ones hands, social cannibalism -all of these are repulsive, undemocratic and dangerous phenomena.
With this letter, we are demanding rigorous judicial and police examinations for the attribution of responsibility for the murderous barbarity, which cost the life of Jacques Kostopoulos. We are calling for initiatives to defend democracy and the rule of law, in front of the dangers caused by fascist logic. We express our solidarity to his close ones and the people who support this case’.
The Steering Committee of the Progressive Caucus
Dimitrios Papadimoulis (GUE/ NGL) – Greece
Georgi Pirinski (S&D) – Bulgaria
Guillaume Balas (S&D) – France
Ernest Urtasun (Greens/ALE) – Spain
Florent Marcellesi (Greens/ALE) – Spain
Elly Schlein (S&D) – Italy
Martin Schirdewan (GUE/NGL) – Germany
Sergio Cofferati (S&D) – Italy
See here the original publication on European Post: