Associated Press/CBS News
March 9, 2011
Nearly 300 immigrants in Greece ended their six-week hunger strike Wednesday after reaching a compromise with the government to delay deportation proceedings against them, supporters of the protest said.
The hunger strike emerged as a crisis for the government as the number of people hospitalized steadily increased. It ended following a meeting with government ministers, who granted the mostly North African hunger strikers temporary permission to remain in Greece, said Thanassis Karabelis, a prominent campaigner for the protesters.
More than 100 of the protesters have been hospitalized since the strike started in Athens and the northern city of Thessaloniki on Jan. 25.
"This is a victory — a victory for the hunger strikers," Karabelis told The Associated Press. "We will start giving the protesters sustenance immediately. Instructions have also been given to our volunteers at hospitals to do the same, so that the patients there can start receiving soup."
Protesters, many who camped for weeks in tents outside a building in central Athens where the hunger strikers were housed, broke out in celebration after the decision was announced.
Under the deal, authorities will suspend the immigrants' deportation orders, and the suspensions will be renewable every six months following review.
"These people are still subject to deportation. But this deportation has been delayed for humanitarian reasons," Deputy Labor Minister Anna Dalara said.
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