AthensLive Wire | “B@llocs in red sauce”

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This is our weekly round-up from Greece.

Greeks are becoming more and more stressed out with the rising prices of basic goods, especially food. The ‘household basket,’ an attempt by the government to diffuse rage and disappointment by supposedly keeping a few basic goods at low prices, was met with severe criticism.

The wiretapping scandal resurfaced as new revelations came to light. While the PEGA Committee was visiting Greece to investigate, it was reported that even a government minister had been wiretapped, while there has been a network in Greece and Cyprus promoting Pegasus.

Three shipwrecks in a day: More refugees and migrants drowned as the EU and Greece continue ahead with a closed borders policy.

It is just unsustainable

We are protagonists in an unfolding terror movie in Greece these last months. Every time you visit the supermarket, the prices are higher to an unsustainable degree for mostly low-income Greeks. According to Eurostat, inflation in the country was 9.8% in October, but food inflation was 13.5% in September - 18.4% in bread and cereal, 17.6% in meat, 23.3% in dairy products and eggs, 17% in oil and fat, 8.7% in groceries, 6.2% in sugar, chocolate, sweets, 12.6% in other food, 14.3 in coffee, cocoa, tea.

It’s only getting worse. It’s probably a phenomenon only war generations have experienced. There was high inflation in the ’80s, for example, but wages were adjusted accordingly, unlike now). Yogurt prices, for example, have nearly doubled and feta cheese has jumped from 7-8 euros to 10+ euros per kilo.

Thus, this week the government introduced something they called the ‘household basket.’ That is 51 basic household items are to be found in the supermarket at controlled and reduced prices.

The list is expected to be updated every Wednesday and includes from toast bread, and spaghetti to toilet paper and pet food.

Price hikes in these 51 items cannot be higher than the inflation rate, state broadcaster ERT announced somehow triumphally.

People were not very welcoming to the ‘household basket’ that premiered on the 2nd of November and is expected to stay in force until March 2023.

The general reaction could be enshrined in what this old man said when asked his opinion by a TV show after shopping. It cannot exactly be translated into English, but he said something like: ‘Bollocks in red sauce.’

Consumers Institute INKA president Giorgos Lechouritis in essence agreed with him. “We had emphasized that this infamous household basket will not relieve the pocket of the Greek consumer. It was not needed. It is clearly a government’s impressions game,” he said in an interview.

Lechouritis claimed that pricey food is mainly a result of speculation. “When a product leaves the field with an X price, how much can it be sold? 200%-300% up? If we don’t specify the profit margin from the field to the shelves, for the next 20 years we’ll be discussing high prices,” he emphasized.

Farmer Giannis Vangos, speaking in the same show, said that the price hikes will be even greater from now on, especially regarding meat and dairy, as animal feed prices have skyrocketed. “As of today, 31 October, everything related to animal and groceries production is 30% up in relation to the last day of 2021.” For a product fridge in August 2020, we paid 7,500 euros in electricity. In 2021, 19,000 euros. In 2022, 60,000.”

What was most shocking though was what Lachouritis said, that in some cases the profit margin between the field and the shelf is 1,000-1,500%, thanks to the intermediaries. A list with prices at the field’ and consumer prices ‘at the shelf’ the final price gouging is registered:

1.750% in olives, from 0.40 to 7.00 euros

750% in apples, from 0.20 to 1.50 euros

682% in pomegranates, from 0.22 to 1.50 euros

600% in pears, from 0.25 to 1.50 euros

400% in lemons, from 0.35 to 1.40 euros

393% in chestnuts, from 1.50 to 5.90 euros

391% in oranges, from 0.23 to 0.90 euros

Mr. Vangos explained that “we sell the apples for 0.20 euros, and the supermarket buys them for 0.75 (before it adds more on the price)”.

Mr. Lechourits said that pellets last year were 319-375 euros per 990 kilos. Today it is sold at 815-830 euros. “Is this price hike justified by transportation costs?” he asked.

“When government MPs themselves treat the country like it’s their loot, the merchant would behave likewise. Those with money step on the others until the latter is extinct,” the farmer said.

A reflection of what the farmer said is depicted in this news item: ‘Porsche is doing crazy sales in Greece.’

A handful of people get ridiculously rich from other people’s extreme suffering.

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A delegation from the European Parliament’s inquiry committee into Pegasus and other spyware visited Cyprus and Greece this week. In Greece, PEGA gave a press conference on Friday, after concluding the meetings with officials during which they requested explanations regarding the Greek executives’ role in using illegal Predator spyware against journalists and politicians.

Newspapers “To Vima” and “Ta Nea” reported on Sunday that in addition to journalists and opposition politicians, the phone of a former New Democracy minister was also bugged as well as that of several businessmen.

More specifically, its report, “To Vima” hinted that a “bridge” was set up by businessmen and individuals from Greece and Cyprus who orchestrated the Predator activities. The people “involved in the negotiations seems to have been known to Grigoris Dimitriadis [ie ex-PM general secretary] or people from his personal circle,” the report said, adding that he denies those claims.

In its report, ‘Ta Nea’ revealed that one minister from the current government “who seems to have had less-than-good relations with the prime minister’s associates, seems to have been recorded — possibly using the Predator spyware.” The paper added that another member of the ruling party in the spring of 2021 detected a text containing a malicious link and deactivated the device he was using at the time. Government spokesman Yannis Oikonomou said the article is speculative and lacked names and concrete facts.

Certain reports claimed that ‘Ta Nea’ actually described former Citizen Protection Minister Michalis Chrysochoides (formerly, PASOK). The minister was cracking ruthlessly on protesters, people hanging out in squares during quarantine. If this is true, this “too hard to die” minister completely ‘swallowed’ his wiretapping as he has made no statements.

While PEGA Committee was visiting Greece, the journalistic website E-tetRadio tweeted: “It has just been verified (with information from abroad, after the necessary checks) that surveillance malware has been detected in a journalist’s mobile phone. More in the following days.” This means we expect new revelations.

Journalist Tassos Telloglou, who published last week a chilling report on his own surveillance, reported this week that Predator trading company Intellexa “took advantage of the crucial time the Mitsotakis government left to pass, meanwhile securing it will remain in the country.”

Meanwhile, the PEGA Committee seems to have left Greece with more questions than those they had when landing in the country. They were particularly critical of the Greek investigation into the matter and the nondisclosure of crucial information by the government. (Find here their official statement.)

PEGA president Leaners said they were surprised that every party in the Parliamentary Investigative Committee came to its own conclusions on the matter and emphasized citizens are entitled to answers and the country needs “a new legal framework.”

PEGA rapporteur Sophie isn't Velt emphasized they will not find who uses Predator in Greece as long as the government does not disclose crucial information. She pointed out that the most crucial information has been characterized as secretive, but the PM could declassify it. She called on him to do it and said that the issue should be cleared before the elections.

Reporters Without Borders has asked the Greek government to pass specific laws protecting journalists against surveillance and illegal spyware activities.

Finally, on a fact-finding mission to Greece from September 26 to 30, the Committee to Protect Journalists spoke with journalists on the ground about how the conditions to enable critical reporting have deteriorated in recent years. Here is what they found.

A boat carrying 68 refugees sank in Cavo Doro, a typically turbulent sea strait in the Aegean Sea, sank on 1 November.

Among the survivors are the two arrestees who served as pilot and co-pilot of the boat, authorities said. They have been charged with forming a criminal organization and for intentionally causing a shipwreck.

Off the coast of Samos island, a dinghy carrying 12 people sank on Monday. Local fishermen rescued two people and Frontex another two. Eight people are still missing.

The fisherman who saved people said that one of them was a pregnant woman and all seemed still in good condition. “I boarded them on my boat, I notified the Coast Guard. They came immediately.”

He also referred to the traffickers' practices: “They come, leave them and go. Other times, they put pressure on them to board, with the threat of a gun. They say to them ‘you'll go there.’ They don’t really know where they are going. Because as soon as they were on my boat, they asked me if it was Turkey and I told them it was Greece”.

Finally, 300 people seem to be still trapped in a boat south of Kalamata, Peloponnese, with the boat’s engine not functioning. They’ve practically “gone missing.”

The refugees seem to have given their stigma for the first time on 28 October, when they were southwest of the island of Crete. No rescue effort seems to have taken place, despite their repeatedly contacting the Coast Guard, as reported.

After days of waiting, the refugees ended up south of Kalamata, where the engine stopped.

The last update from Alarm Phone NGO was last Saturday afternoon. The NGO lost contact with the people, as they reported.

EfSyn noted that a similar incident of “disappearing refugees” had been reported in the south of Crete at the beginning of September. Authorities then kept a similar stance, denying there was a boat. Turkish authorities announced the next day they detected 120 people on a liferaft off Smyrna. The passengers reported that Greek authorities had pushed them back.

Since the beginning of the year, more than 300 migrants and refugees have lost their lives in the Eastern Mediterranean, most of them in the Aegean Sea, the daily Kathimerini reported. This is double that last year.

In Greece's largest port of Piraeus, China is the boss: In Germany, a heated debate has been raging about the Chinese state shipping company Cosco buying a minority stake in a container terminal at the port of Hamburg. Greece, however, seems to have no such concerns.

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