The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

Greece: death of Manolis Glézos, "first resistance fighter in Europe" according to General de Gaulle

2020-03-30T13:09:43.196Z



The hero of the Greek resistance against the Nazis, Manolis Glézos, who died on Monday March 30 at the age of 97, was described as "the first resistance fighter in Europe " by General de Gaulle, for having dared, in 1941, to win the Nazi flag of the Acropolis of Athens.

" The Germans had just cut the last Allied pocket in Crete " and " Hitler said that 'Europe (was) free'. We wanted to prove to him that the fight was just beginning, ”declared Manolis Glézos, during an interview with AFP in June 2011.

On the night of May 30 to 31, 1941, then aged 18, Manolis Glézos took down, with his friend Apostolos Santas, 19, the Nazi flag of the ancient Athenian monument.

" A Greek policeman checked our papers for violating a curfew when we were leaving the Acropolis, but he never spoke, " he said in this interview.

Sentenced in absentia by the Nazis to death, the two men were arrested by chance in March 1942 before being released a month later, the Nazis did not recognize in them the authors of the episode of the Acropolis .

Apostolos Santas died in April 2011.

This heroic action had crossed the Greek borders, General de Gaulle having called Manolis Glezos "the first resistance fighter in Europe ". But the interested party, who continued to militate on the left, always kept a low profile, highlighting the collective action " of combatants " of the resistance.

He died Monday at the age of 97 in a hospital in Athens where he had been admitted for an infection and gastroenteritis, announced the public television ERT.

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2020-03-30

You may like

News/Politics 2024-03-13T06:32:32.011Z

Trends 24h

News/Politics 2024-03-27T16:45:54.081Z
News/Politics 2024-03-28T06:04:53.137Z

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.