Great tribute to the Michael Protopsaltis, the 66-year-old rescuer who saved the lives of 80 Afghans a few weeks ago in Kythera, the Guardian reports.
«Michael Protopsaltis does not see himself as a hero» begins the article of the British newspaper. «When the news of the shipwreck came, he said, he did what anyone would do. The owner of a construction company used one of his cranes right on the cliff's edge and rescued one of 80 Afghan migrants fighting for their lives under the water's surface.».
Today, almost three weeks after the dramatic scenes that unfolded on the island, the 66-year-old is to be honoured at the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Insular Policy. The reverberations of the tragic and shocking events of that night have not yet faded. Kyriakos Mitsotakis called him personally to thank him.
«What we saw that night was hell, absolutely horrific, something I never thought I'd see,» Protopsalti told the Guardian. «The sea was raging, the wind was raging, the waves were so big and all these people down there in that cave, trying to hold on, trying to somehow get into the bag, sometimes two at a time but mostly one at a time, for the crane to get them up to the top.’.
«Neither I nor anyone else - and there must have been about 100 of us there - thought twice about it (...) no one forced us to help. All those things that say that Greeks leave migrants to die in the sea makes me angry, because it's not true.», he told the newspaper.
«All this talk of heroism is exaggerated. What we did was simply human. In Kythera we always help those in need. From America and Argentina to South Africa and Australia, there are Kythirians and so we have all experienced migration. I don't know what is happening elsewhere, but we would never let people drown,» Protopsaltis said.
The accusations of pushbacks - which human rights organisations say are facilitated by Frontex - have tarnished Greece's human rights record and embarrassed officials in Brussels, as the bloc's external border management policies and more broadly criticised.
As the paper reports, the centre-right government in Athens has repeatedly denied that it engages in summary deportations and claims that Turkey deliberately pushes people across the land and sea borders of the two countries. Greece's Migration Minister, Notis Mitarakis, pledged to put the issue at the top of the agenda when he meets with UN General Assembly President Csaba Kőrösi.
Protopsaltis, however, says politics played no role in the rescue, although he admits he is a supporter of the government. «People were in danger, their lives were in danger. All we were all thinking about was how they could be saved,» he said.
«The truth is that civilized people want to behave in a civilized way. It was only when they got to my house that I thought, even though we're being blamed for all these things, here we are, a group of people on a small island in Greece who saved 80 souls tonight because it was the right thing to do.».
I'm not surprised! I know Michael Protopsaltis personally and he is exactly as you describe him! A man above all!