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REPORT ON THE FINDINGS

(In accordance with article 4 par. 6 of Act 2477/1997)

CASE NO 11828/2000

 

Athens, 26 January 2000

 

On the 17^th of July, 2000 the Greek Ombudsman received by way of the “Greek Helsinki Monitor” a complaint from Mr. Georgios Panagiotopoulos, Mr. Dionysios Halilopoulos and Mr. Konstantine Kalogeropoulos (see enc.1). Their complaint concerned the legality of actions taken by services of the Municipality of Aspropyrgos, which resulted in the expulsion of Roma from their encampment ground and the demolition of their makeshift homes in Aspropyrgos. The complainants claimed that the demolished sheds, situated next to the municipality’s rubbish dump, constituted the only homes they, their families and fellow Roma have known for a number of years.

Specifically, the complainants claim that on the morning of the 14^th of July, 2000 a team from the technical services department of the Municipaliy of Aspropyrgos, equipped with a bulldozer, and assisted by police officers from the local police station, demolished, in the presence of the Mayor Mr. G. Liako, the small makeshift homes and sheds of the Roma camp. Until then the camp had been situated within the prefectural administration of the Municipality of Aspropyrgos on lands owned by the Municipality. According to the complainants, only eight sheds escaped demolition, sheds which at the time were occupied by aged persons or people with health problems who could not be moved immediately. However, these occupants also received a verbal three-day notice to depart from the area.

Members of the non-governmental organization “Greek Helsinki Monitor” made strong objections to the Municipality and the local police commissioner, arguing that the destroyed dwellings comprised the only standing homes many large Roma families had. In response to these protests Deputy Mayor Mr. Bazigos replied that no homes were demolished, but trash was cleared from the area. This assertion was reiterated at every contact, verbal or written, that the Ombudsman has had with the Municipality of Aspropyrgos.

In the days immediately following this event contact with the mayor or the deputy mayors became impossible, because despite the Ombudsman’s efforts to communicate with them by telephone, they avoided discussing the matter. For this reason on the 25^th of July, 2000 an urgent letter (ref.no11128/00/2.1) was sent via fax to the municipality (see enc. 2). In this letter the Ombudsman’s telephone queries were repeated, placing specific emphasis on the following issue: was the formal procedure required by law observed during the implementation of the municipality’s initiative to remove the Roma from the public lands and to destroy their makeshift homes? The provisions of Legislative Decree 31/1968, of Legislative Decree 263/1968 and of Law 2307/1995, require that prior to any action, a decision be made by the Municipal Council and an official notification of the order to vacate the land be issued to the individuals who willfully occupy it. The purpose of these provisions, apparently, is to safeguard the right of these individuals to defend themselves utilizing every possible means of appeal available to them. Lastly, the Ombudsman’s letter categorically pointed out the possibility that the aforementioned material actions carried out by the services of the Municipality could constitute an offense punishable by law.

In response to his letter the Ombudsman received a document (ref. no 17390/4.8.2000) from the Mayor of Aspropyrgos (see enc.3). Also enclosed were a written complaint from concerned citizens that had previously been submitted regarding the encampment in of Roma in the area and attributing to them the amassing of garbage (see enc.4), and the pertinent forwarding document from the Prefecture of Attica to the Municipality of Aspropyrgos (see enc.5). In his response, the Mayor of Aspropyrgos persists in maintaining that the actions taken were legal, indirectly contending that there was never an expulsion of Roma from the area or a demolition of their sheds but simply, “a removal of garbage left behind by passing gypsies”. The removal, according to the Mayor, was lawfully carried out by the municipal services, in compliance with the relevant provisions of the Municipal Code (Presidential Decree 410/1995).

In view of the indirect refusal of the Mayor to accept the facts presented by the complainants and his insistent characterization of the event not as expulsion of persons from their settlement but as “removal of garbage”, the Ombudsman sought additional verification of the real facts. With his letter to the complainants (ref. no 11128/00/2.2/5.9.2000) the Ombudsman requested that they submit further evidence which could authenticate the truth of their claims (see enc.6). Simultaneously, with his letter to the Mayor of Aspropyrgos (ref. no. 11828/00/2.3/11.9.2000) the Ombudsman informed him that he was gathering data pertaining to the truth of the claims made by all sides (see enc.7). The Mayor was also asked to state unambiguously whether he persists in his contention that, at the time of the events, there was no demolition of habitable dwellings.

Following the Ombudsman’s call, the complainants responded to his request by submitting a series of photographs depicting the encampment area before and after the municipality’s “garbage removal” enterprise (see enc.8&9). Members of the non-governmental organization “Doctors of the World” (Medicins du Monde) had taken photographs depicting the area before the municipality’s undertaking. They were taken in the context of their daily presence in the camp during the previous year for the purpose of developing medical and social welfare programs for this vulnerable community. Members of the non-governmental organization “Greek Helsinki Monitor” took photographs depicting the area after the municipality’s undertaking in response to the Ombudsman’s request to the complainants. In addition, two representatives from these non-governmental organizations, Mrs. Elpida Euthemiatou and Mrs. Christina Rouggeri, declared that they were ready to attest, under oath if necessary, to the truth of the statements made by the complainants. (See the Medicins du Monde document ref. no 839/M.N./19.9.2000 addressed to the Greek Ombudsman, enc.10)

In contrast to the complainants’ response, and despite the repeated reminders of the Ombudsman, the mayor and other officials of the Municipality of Asrpopyrgos avoided responding to the last aforementioned letter of the Ombudsman. (They maintained their silence until a few days before the writing of the present report.) The Ombudsman, in view of this prolonged silence, sent another letter (ref. no 11128/2.4/6.11.2000) which repeated his initial request to the Mayor of Aspropyrgos(see enc. 11). Furthermore, in accordance with the provisions of Article 4 of Law 2477/1997, the Ombudsman set a deadline of the 20^th of November, 2000 by which the mayor had to comply. The mayor was also informed that the complainants had responded positively to the Ombudsman’s request and had produced critical photographic material as evidence.

Once again the Mayor of Aspropyrgos did not reply during the prescribed period. Thus, the Ombudsman brought up again his request with a new letter (ref. no 11128/00/2.5/14.12.2000). In this letter the Mayor was advised of the provisions of Law 2477/1997, according to which the refusal of a public functionary to co-operate with the Ombudsman during an investigation constitutes a disciplinary offense of breach of duty. A new deadline, 29^th of December 2000, was set for him to reply (see enc.12).

On the 19^th of December 2000, the Ombudsman received a telephone call from Deputy Mayor Mr. Meletiou, who declared complete ignorance of the municipality’s failure to co-operate with the Ombudsman up until then. He requested that copies of all the pending letters be sent to him. This request resulted in dispatching anew copies all of the aforementioned Ombudsman’s letters together with a covering letter (ref. no. 11128/00/2.6/19.12.2000, see enc.13). It must be pointed out, though, that prior to the deputy mayor’s contacting the Ombudsman, a document had been issued from the Prefecture of Attica to the Municipality of Aspropyrgos (ref. no 9101/7.12.000). In this document the municipality is asked to provide a briefing about the case and to comply with the Ombudsman’s requests (see enc.14). After that, senior investigator Mr. Andreas Takis received a telephone call from the mayor who stated that the municipality’s viewpoint about this case had already been definitely formulated and disclosed in the ref. no 17390/4.8.2000 document and that nothing had changed since then. Mr. Takis requested that this statement be sent to the Ombudsman in writing. Finally, the Mayor’s letter (ref. no 396/9.1.2001) reached the Ombudsman (see enc.15).

The Greek Ombudsman, after careful consideration of all the documents and other data (i.e., photographic material, verbal testimonies, etc…) which had been collected during the investigation of this case, is strongly convinced that the following is true:

1.               The material actions carried out by a team from the technical services department of the Municipality of Aspropyrgos on the morning of July 14, 2000 in the area next to the rubbish dump of Ano Liosia included, besides the incidental removal of garbage, the demolition of makeshift sheds. Persons belonging to the vulnerable community of Roma inhabited these sheds at the time. The fact that some of the occupants were not present in their sheds at the time of the municipality’s operation does not alter the fact that these sheds were residences. The absence of the occupants can be explained in many ways. For example, they may have been absent because they were working or because they were hiding in fear at the sight of police officers. (Some members of this community come from countries such as Albania or the former Yugoslavia and do not possess a legal permit to stay in the country). Furthermore, these dwellings do not lose their status as residences just because they do not meet the current common perception of what constitutes a proper residence, even if this perception is shared by the majority of Greek citizens. Finally, even if some of the dismantled tin homes had been in fact abandoned or were being used as impromptu lodgings for “gypsies passing through”, still most comprised the only permanent home for a large number of many-member families for many years.

2.               It follows, then, that the almost certain demolition of the Roma residences was not simply intended to prevent possession of land owned by the Municipality of Aspropyrgos by members of the Roma community, but actually constituted the material act par excellence for the realization of this intention. In this instance, then, it does not appear to be relevant if this expulsion may have served other purposes as well.

3.               The material acts that have resulted in the expulsion of Roma are not supported by any official administrative expulsion order requiring them to depart from the specific area. As has been already established, the Municipality of Aspropyrgos has not produced such a document, and it does not appear anywhere that such a relevant decision was ever made by the Municipal Council.

The provisions of Article 2, Par.1 of Law 263/1968 state that, “against any individual who willfully takes possession of any public land is issued …an administrative expulsion order legally served to the subject(s) to whom is directed”. Furthermore, Article 1, par.12 of the Law 2307/1995 states that, “the administrative expulsion order referred to in article 2 of Law 263 /1968, dealing with municipal and communal lands, is issued by the Mayor or the president of the village council, following a decision by the municipal or the village council”. Therefore, in view of these provisions, the strongly probable enactment of material acts for the expulsion of Roma from the public lands in which they had resided for many years, without observance of the administrative expulsion procedure required by law, is manifestly illegal.

The persistence of the municipal authority in characterizing the whole event as “removal of garbage” and their later references to the relevant provisions from the Municipal Code which prescribe their specific responsibilities, in conjunction with their equally persistent refusal to acknowledge that people’s dwellings were demolished lead to the conjecture that at least the public servants who occupy the highest positions of the municipal authority were aware of the illegal nature of these material actions or, in any case, considered that the administrative procedure required by law preventing the occupation of public lands does not necessarily apply to “gypsies”. The observance of the relevant provisions is not an obligation that belongs in the general duties of public functionaries but specific public duty of the municipal officials. In any case, the staff of the municipal authority had complete knowledge of the hardship which the Roma would have experienced with the demolition of their dwellings, the destruction of the household goods which they contained, and their forcible removal from the place which until then had been their home. In addition, although the illegal initiative of the Municipality of Aspropyrgos had as a purpose, in the final analysis, to reclaim this area, the fact that the chosen means for the realization of this purpose was exactly the demolition of the Roma homes and the destruction of their household contents, so that they would be forced to depart from the area, leads to the conclusion that the damage inflicted on the Roma was in part on the goal of the municipal authority. Consequently, in view of the aforementioned seriously considered real occurrences, it is judged that there are sufficient indications of acts carried out which prima facie present all the necessary objective and subjective constitutive elements of a breach of duty (Criminal Code 259).

Consequently, it is considered necessary in accordance with Article 4 Par.6 of the Law 2477/1997 to forward the case to the relevant Minister of Internal Affairs, to the General Secretary of the relevant prefecture, as well as, the Public Prosecutor of Athens, so as to initiate an investigation, in view of all the aforementioned, on probable disciplinary and criminal responsibility of the officials of the Municipality of Aspropyrgos or other involved persons. 

 

Yiorgos Kaminis

Assistant Professor of Constitutional Law of University of Athens Deputy Ombudsman for Human Rights

 

 

Handling and Information: Mr. Andreas Ch. Takis, senior investigator in the Human Rights Department.