A fight for free journalism!

This morning, two extremely interesting trials are beginning, against a backdrop of revealing reports on two bizarre cancellations of the freezing of the assets of the most inconsistent – both on a fiscal and a private insurance level – Greek businessman, the chairman of Express Service Giannis Raptopoulos, and the general preferential treatment he receives. These cancellations were signed by Finance minister Giorgos Papakonstantinou.

One of them is about the falsification of IKA documents so that Express Service would illegally receive insurance update certification, with Raptopoulos and a team of IKA executives as the accused. The second is the application for interim measures, which the businessman accused of forgery filed on Thursday against the newspaper "Proto Thema", the protothema gr website and 8 of its journalists.

Already, many support messages have been sent to the editorial team of "Proto Thema", which assures its readers that in any case, it will perform its journalistic and informative duties this Sunday. It is no coincidence that the leadership of the ESIEA and ESPIT have expressed their support, while tomorrow's legal battle will be joined, among others, by the president of the Athens Lawyers Association, Giannis Adamopoulos, as a defense counsel of the newspaper, along with known politicians who have spent years in the journalism sector.

Meanwhile, and besides the outcome of the trial for the interim measures filed by the businessman, who reportedly owes millions of euros to the IRS and Social Security services, the public awaits with great anticipation the outcome of the forgery trial, A strange case that will finally reach the public, away from political or other such like interventions, which are known practices of Mr Raptopoulos.

Protothema.gr is continuously covering the story with live correspondence and video from the legal battle from its reporters, Vasiliki Kokkali, Iliana Gavala, Vasilis Goulas and Vasilis Dalianis, and technical support by Giannis Bistogiannakis and Christos Vrettos.