Shortly before 11:00 AM local time, the farmers who spent the night in Syntagma Square after yesterday’s rally started to make their way back home. In fact, around 12:00 PM, Syntagma Square reopened, and the closed roads were reopened to traffic.
Watch a video of the tractors that left Syntagma Square:
Shortly before 1:00 PM, the tractors moved on the Athens-Lamia highway in the left lane, which caused traffic.
Video with the tractors in the Athens-Lamia road:
See the traffic on the streets
Some, more hard-line, put on the table yesterday the idea of the tractors staying outside the Parliament until their demands are met, but it was decided not to change the plan and to leave it in sections and coordinated, with the the same way in which they arrived in Athens.
According to the latest information from the Greek police, Vasilissis Amalias and Vasilissis Sophias Avenues, as well as Panepistimiou street, have been reopened to vehicle traffic.
Traffic measures on Syggrou Avenue and Kallirois Street have also been lifted.
Traffic had also returned to normal on Aghiou Konstantinou and Achilleos Streets and on Athinon Avenue, where measures had been taken due to the tractors’ departure.
At least 6,500 participants with over 160 tractors and agricultural machinery were at Syntagma, according to estimates, while 112 buses transported farmers from several regions to Athens.
Their consistent demands were for a lower fuel price, a drop of electricity cost to 7 cents/KW, and subsidies for fertilizers, animal feed, and equipment. They said that the measures announced by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis when he met with the Panhellenic Blockades Committee are not enough.
Farmers also spoke of cheap imports from non-EU countries that are of doubtful quality and resold at higher prices as Greek. “This year, when our animal capital was reduced, where did the milk come from, and not only that, the price the farmers were paid fell?”
On Thursday, they will hold general assemblies at the blockades to inform other farmers and to decide about future mobilizations.
Thessaly farmers noted that they expected to meet with the prime minister in the coming week, to discuss specifically the Thessaly plain that was destroyed by the storm ‘Daniel’.
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