Dimitris Koutsoumbas: No to imperialist war! Greece’s involvement must stop immediately!

On 27/2/22, the CC of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) organized an event in the city of Lamia in honour of the 80 years of the Greek People’s Liberation Army (ELAS), which was the military wing of the National Liberation Front (EAM). Both EAM and ELAS were founded following a decision of the KKE and fought against the fascist triple foreign occupation (German, Italian, and Bulgarian) of Greece during the imperialist Second World War.

The event took place in Lamia, the native city of Aris Velouchiotis, leader of ELAS and cadre of the KKE.

Aris Velouchiotis: The soul of Greek Resistance

Today, June 16th, marks the 75th anniversary since the death of the iconic Greek communist guerrilla Aris Velouchiotis. A member of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and First Captain of the Greek People’s Liberation Army (ELAS) during World War Two, Velouchiotis is a leading personality of the Greek Resistance against the Axis occupation. 

Aris Velouchiotis, whose real name was Thanasis Klaras, Born in Lamia to a wealthy family on August 27, 1905, Aris studied at Larisa’s Averoff Agricultural School and worked briefly as an agronomist. 

Moving to Athens, he became a member of the Communist Youth (OKNE) in 1922 and a member of the KKE in 1925. Due to his radical, communist views he was sent to Kalpaki Disciplinary Platoon, an army camp where communist soldiers were imprisoned and tortured. 

Honoring Greek guerrilla leader and communist revolutionary Aris Velouchiotis

Today is the 71st anniversary of the death of the First Captain of the People's Army (ELAS) Aris Velouchiotis (1905-1945). Velouchiotis was a partisan, member of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and guerrilla leader during the Axis occupation in WW2. 

Aris, who was born in Lamia, central Greece in 1905, was a cadre of the Communist Party of Greece and at the decision of the party he undertook the formation of the People’s Army (ELAS) during the fascist occupation, the armed wing of the National Liberation Front (EAM).

Aris opposed the Varkiza Agreement, which disarmed ELAS, and returned to the mountains. In June 1945, his small armed group was surrounded in Mesounda (Arta) and killed by the bourgeois army, which desecrated their corpses, cutting off the heads of Aris and his comrades, which were hung in the central square in the town of Trikala. The then leadership of the party disowned him. 

However, after 1957, the KKE in essence gradually rehabilitated him, something that was confirmed by the decision to politically rehabilitate him during the discussion on the 2nd Volume of the History of the Party, 1949-1968, at the Nationwide Conference in 2011. On 9 October 2011, an event was held by the CC of the KKE for the presentation of the Decision of the Nationwide Conference concerning the official political rehabilitation of the first captain of ELAS, Aris Velouchiotis. A large delegation of the CC of the KKE headed by the then GS of the CC, Aleka Papariga, was present. Speaking at the rally, Telemachus Dimoulas, member of the PB of the CC of the KKE, made extensive reference to the essay on the history of the KKE approved by the National Conference of the KKE and the special decision concerning Aris Velouchiotis. "In the consciousness of the people, Aris Velouchiotis is identified with the heroic history of the KKE, the struggle for the overthrow of imperialist barbarity”.