Small incidents can pack hefty messages. Yesterday afternoon, a tiny drama unfolded at Paris airport, as I was disembarking the airplane that had brought me over from Athens. It speaks volumes about the state of our European Union and the drift toward inane authoritarianism. A French policeman, for no obvious reason, took it to himself to be hostile and to manhandle me after having checked and returned my passport. As I conclude in my official complaint (lodged by my lawyers) with the French Police, As a European citizen, I refuse to accept the normalization of such behaviour at any border crossing of the European Union, especially Schengen Treaty borders that the European Union was meant to have done away
Topics:
Yanis Varoufakis considers the following as important: English, European Crisis, Politics and Economics
This could be interesting, too:
Yanis Varoufakis writes Jamie Galbraith on DiEM-TV’s ‘Another Now’ discussing the “criminal incapacity of the elites”
Yanis Varoufakis writes A chronicle of our BLEAK TWENTIES – Cambridge Union Online
Yanis Varoufakis writes European Oligarchy Has Banned Transfer of Wealth to Poor: Interviewed by Vijay Prashad
Yanis Varoufakis writes Have Merkel & Macron just announced a eurobond-funded godsend for the EU? DiEM25’s view
Small incidents can pack hefty messages. Yesterday afternoon, a tiny drama unfolded at Paris airport, as I was disembarking the airplane that had brought me over from Athens. It speaks volumes about the state of our European Union and the drift toward inane authoritarianism.
A French policeman, for no obvious reason, took it to himself to be hostile and to manhandle me after having checked and returned my passport. As I conclude in my official complaint (lodged by my lawyers) with the French Police,
- As a European citizen, I refuse to accept the normalization of such behaviour at any border crossing of the European Union, especially Schengen Treaty borders that the European Union was meant to have done away with.
- As a Greek citizen, and also as an elected member of Greece’s Parliament, it is incumbent upon me to demonstrate against such behaviour aimed at any citizen of the Republic of Greece.
PS1. Thankfully, videos recorded by fellow passengers (see here and here) leave no room for doubt regarding the incident
PS. I was amused to hear that the perpetrator-policeman is planning to… sue me. This is, of course, absurd. For if I had violated the law in any way, he should arrest me. Policemen arrest citizens for legal transgressions and only citizens sue police for abuse of power.