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The Vice-President of the Greek government Theodoros Pangalos became the subject of violent attacks by Greek and French students, and intellectuals during an evening dedicated to the philosopher Costas Akselos and the director Costas Gavras in Paris. The event was organized at the House of Greece in the university complex in the French capital.

A group of young people in solidarity with the 300 illegal immigrants on hunger strike in Athens and Thessaloniki launched verbal attacks to the eminent politician and blamed him for being the "moral degradation" incarnation of the Greek political life and called him "murderer."

The hiss started when T. Pangalos entered the hall. He left and came in again after the intervention of the famous director Costas Gavras but this only flared up those present.

Theodoros Pangalos proposed the young people to meet for an open debate the next day, but they did not agree.

"I respect Gavras, but you don’t respect him," counter attacked the Vice-President of the Greek government. "Then sit in your place, because we do not respect you," replied the angry students.

Costas Gavras tried to protect Theodoros Pangalos, but this only called down the anger of the youths for the presence of the politician. They invited Costas Gavras to leave him rather sharply and bluntly.

"We do not accept the presence of a killer at the performance of the magnificent films of Mr. Gavras." "You talked about democracy, Mr. Gavras, and said that the Greek government is elected by the people. A month ago Mr. Pangalos treated the Greeks as idiots and called us "lazy-bones". Do you think this is a democratic attitude?"

Theodoros Pangalos left the hall after the brawl, booed by the audience. The Greek ambassador, Costas Gavras and most of those present left after him.

The Greek students shouted "out, out", "Did we eat the money together?", "Get out of the country" and held a poster reading "in Greece as in France, support for undocumented immigrants."

A message was circulated from the office of Theodoros Pangalos shortly afterwards that the attacks against him were the work of "anarchists and supporters of the left coalition SYRIZA" and the students’ attacks are defined as "terrorist."

"The argument of anarchists and members of SYRIZA that a representative of the Greek government was the reason for their reaction is totally incorrect, as they recognize themselves in various blogs that they did not know anything about the presence of the Vice-President of the government," says the announcement.

According to it, the aim of the youths was to prevent in a violent way the screening of the film Z and the film Paradise of the West to be shown in its place in which the main character is an illegal immigrant in order to bring in the limelight the issue of the ongoing immigrants’ hunger strike in Athens and Thessaloniki.

"There is no doubt that Greek society is faced with an organized attempt to impose violence and instability which unfortunately is hidden under the political cover of parliamentary, ie party links in the system.

What happened in Paris and Berlin, or is going to happen in London and Rome tomorrow, is damaging the international image of the country and its efforts to emerge from the crisis. Who wants Greece to sink into chaos?" says the message.
 
The events in Paris happened a few days after the attacks of Greek students against the Prime Minister George Papandreou in Berlin. The left coalition SYRIZA tried to disassociate with the actions of the angry youths, while the far-right party LAOS commented that the "fake spontaneous performances" in the country and abroad are the result of the strategy of leftist parties. It is clear that they are not aware of the consequences if a spark escapes."

The representative of the starving immigrants Abdul Haji supported SYRIZA and said that "allegations that SYRIZA is behind the events in France is a big lie. Nobody can force the immigrants to go on a hunger strike. This is an insinuation that has been following us since the first day of the strike at the Law School."

Hundreds of comments have appeared in Greek media. Some of their authors argue that the Greek students at western universities in fact do what the majority of Greek society would like to do, while others agree that the protests against the Greek politicians are the work of supporters of leftist parties.  

The truth probably lies in the middle. Or at least the comments of hundreds of people who saw the amateur video of the incident in Youtube show this. Anyway, the fiery slogans in support of the starving immigrants at the end of the message that the youths from the "initiative of Greek students and workers in Paris" released shortly after the events is not different from any of the slogans of left and far-left groups in Athens.