INVITATION TO A FOUNDING ASSEMBLY
OF AN INTERNATIONALIST STRUGGLE AND SOLIDARITY MOVEMENT
OF LOCALS, REFUGEES, AND MIGRANTS
The uprooting of refugees and migrants is accelerating as inter-capitalist rivalries ignite wars and foreign interventions, while political, religious, and racial persecution, combined with ruthless exploitation, impoverishment , resource plundering, and environmental devastation force millions to flee. The capitalist crisis deepens this suffering by turning migration routes into perilous paths and intensifying the hardships faced by those in host countries.
In Greece, the government, mainstream media, and establishment parties have joined the far right in promoting racist attacks and xenophobic propaganda. Successive governments—from PASOK and SYRIZA-ANEL to the current New Democracy administration—have implemented the EU Migration and Asylum Pact.
Migrants are scapegoated for unemployment, poverty, and crime—issues that actually stem from austerity and capitalist exploitation. While the ruling class rhetorically opposes migrants, they favor migration under conditions that guarantee cheap labor stripped of social and political rights.
The policies of governments, the EU, and capital to overcome the crisis at the expense of workers strike mainly migrants, as they constitute the most vulnerable section of the working class.Under the pretext of border control, the EU and national governments are restricting democratic freedoms for all. This anti-migrant offensive aligns with the "war on terror" and the "Fortress Europe" policy, using repressive “anti-terror” laws to systematically deprive the working class of constitutional rights, and cultivate nationalism and racism.
The New Democracy government has a leading role within the EU, sending frigates to international waters near Libya for deadly pushback operations. These policies have led to hundreds of deaths in our seas and at the Evros border, (the crime of Pylos with more than 600 drowned refugees, and more recently the crime in Chios with 15 killed refugee). Nearly all parliamentary parties consent to this policy, accept the border fences and anti-refugee measures, and reproduce the narrative that refugees and migrants threaten national security.
Recently, the government passed two anti-refugee/anti-migrant laws (5226/2025 and 5275/2026) which criminalize refuge, migration, and even solidarity, establishing heavy fines and imposing sentences up to life imprisonment for "migrant smuggling," a definition broad enough to target legally residing migrants who assist undocumented persons. These laws target both new arrivals and those who have lived and worked in Greece for years. They legitimize the recruitment of migrants without rights and simplify administrative "fast-track" procedures providing a steady supply of temporary, disposable labor for major public works and strategic investments.
At the same time, the persecution of migrants and refugees is intensifying through imprisonments, deportations, pushbacks, forced returns, and procedures to revoke asylum from political refugees. Detention, ghettoization, and violations of human rights, including access to work, education, and healthcare, are being institutionalized.
We, refugees, migrants from various communities, and locals who have been active in solidarity movements and common struggles, whether individually or through trade unions, student associations, and collectives, have come together, discussed the situation, and believe that it is necessary to initiate a new collective movement effort for long-term intervention and action, independent of the state, capital, the EU, the trade union bureaucracy, and political “figures.”
We consider it our class-based, internationalist duty to support refugees and migrants in their struggle for rights and freedoms. We believe that the joint struggle of locals, refugees, and migrants can achieve real results.
We therefore take the initiative—drawing on the political experience of struggles in recent years—to call for the creation of an Internationalist Struggle and Solidarity Movement of Locals, Refugees, and Migrants.
We address locals, refugees, and migrants, and all those concerned about this situation, to participate in the founding process and join the movement.
The founding assembly will take place on Sunday, March 1, 2026, 11:00pm at the event hall of the 7th Municipal Community of the Municipality of Athens, 59 Panormou Street (1st floor), near Panormou metro station.
19/2/2026
Initiative for the Creation
of an Internationalist Struggle and Solidarity Movement
of Locals, Refugees, and Migrants
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