The KKE denounces the dangerous games that New Democracy, SYRIZA and PASOK are playing with the Muslim minority of Thrace. All the more so at a time when serious unfavourable settlements in Greek-Turkish relations are in the pipeline, with the direct intervention of the US–NATO, which have established their presence in Thrace with the responsibility of both the New Democracy and the SYRIZA government.

The acute problems faced by the minority in Thrace have the same cause as those faced by the entire Greek people; therefore the struggle must be joint within the framework of the labour and popular movement. This struggle must be directed against the plans of both the Greek and Turkish bourgeois classes, which intervene by blackmailing the people and by other methods because they want the minority to be a rubber stamp for their plans.

Another element of this intervention over time is the activity of the Turkish consulate in favour of candidates from all bourgeois parties and especially the attempt to establish the conception of “collective self-definition” as a “Turkish minority” which opposes the Treaty of Lausanne and opens up very dangerous paths. Those who pretend to have just found out about such intervention are hypocrites.

Minorities should be bridges of friendship and solidarity between the peoples. This is the necessity expressed by the KKE and its candidates from the Muslim minority of Thrace. We address the minority on the sole criterion of common class interests, free from any division on the grounds of religion, language or ethnic origin. That is why the people need to join forces with the KKE in the run-up to the elections, against the anti-popular policy of the governments and the plans of the bourgeois classes and imperialist organizations.

13.06.2023