Answering to History

Throughout his 21-day trial for high treason and insurrection, former Dictator George Papadopoulos acted as if he still considered himself the most powerful man in Greece. Slavishly deferential, Papadopoulos' 19 co-defendants in the trial at Korydallos Prison on the outskirts of Athens referred to him as "Mr. President." When talking to reporters, the squat, jaunty Papadopoulos assured them that he would not be in jail for long. Disdainfully refusing to enter a plea in his defense, he crowed, "I shall answer only to history and the Greek people." To which Court President Ioannis Deyannis replied, his small sharp features pinched in anger, "Do you think history is absent from this courtroom?"

Papadopoulos shrugged off the question. Less easily shrugged off was the verdict. At week's end Papadopoulos was sentenced to death before a firing squad, along with Nicholas Makarezos and Stylianos Pattakos, his chief aides in the 1967 coup. Of the 17 other defendants, eight drew life imprisonment, including Dimitrios loannides, the tough former military police chief; seven received prison terms ranging from five to 20 years; and two were acquitted. When he heard the word thanaton--Greek for death--Papadopoulos' fixed smile suddenly disappeared. There is a possibility, however, that the government might commute the three death sentences.

Only a few miles from Korydallos, the men alleged to have been the grand inquisitors of the Papadopoulos regime also faced trial. Before a military tribunal, 31 officers and men of ESA, the notorious Greek military police, faced charges of torture. Witness after witness testified that within a week of Papadopoulos' April 21, 1967, coup more than 8,000 had been arrested. Of these, 6,188 were banished into exile. Another 3,500 were subsequently sent to ESA torture centers. One prosecution witness, former Colonel Spyridon Moustaklis, 49, was unable to answer questions because brain damage caused by beatings had left him mute and semiparalyzed. Communicating by groans and gestures, glaring at the defendants, Moustaklis clumsily tore his shirt open to reveal the scars that marked his body. Said his wife: "We have a little girl who has never heard her father's voice." Verdicts on the 31 accused, which could lead to maximum sentences of 25 years, are due next month.

Day of the Coup. One question left unanswered by both trials was whether the American CIA actively supported the seven-year Papadopoulos regime, as is widely believed in Greece. Deyannis forbade almost all discussion of the question by insisting that the court was interested solely in finding out what happened on the day of the coup. The most important testimony touching on the CIA to be admitted during the trial came from Andreas Papandreou, the leader of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement and a volubly anti-American leftist. According to Papandreou, the Greek intelligence service (KYP) was heavily financed and directed by its U.S. counterpart. "I can assure you," he testified, "that these men [the defendants] worked in direct cooperation and correspondence with the Americans."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.