The Greek diaspora in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union

to the United Nations about their country’s decision to forbid
their return but the UN never recognised them as (political)
refugees. This attitude could possibly be explained
by the prevailing anti-communist context in which every
decision in western Europe, and consequently in the UN,
was made at the time.
At this point we should present some statistical information
concerning repatriation, starting with the number and
composition of the refugees at the point when repatriation
was about to begin. Table 8 shows the figures for political
refugees in 1975 (before they returned home); according to
this data, the political refugees in 1975 (without taking into
account those in Yugoslavia) amounted to 56,200, most of
whom had settled in the former Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia.
According to some other information, 14,780
(26.3 percent) of them were children and students, 32,790
(58.3 percent) were employees, 7,295 (12.9 percent) retired,
and 1,355 (2.4 percent) non-working (mostly women).
Country of destination Total refugees Percent
of total
East Germany 1,500 2.6
Bulgaria 6,800 12.0
Hungary 4,800 8.5
Poland 9,000 16.0
Romania 5,600 9.9
Former Soviet Union 15,000 26.0
Czechoslovakia 13,500 24.0
Total 56,200 100.0
Classification according to age, provides us with the
following data: 15,000 (26.7 percent) were born outside
Greece (and were up to 25 years old in 1975), 20,000 (35.6
percent) were up to 18 years old upon leaving Greece (and
up to 45 years old in 1975), and 21,200 (37.7 percent) were
over 18 years old upon leaving Greece (and over 45 years
old in 1975). This data reveals the tragedy of many EAM/
ELAS fighters who died outside of their country because of
the long duration of their exile. The proportion of former
fighters returning home would be even smaller after 1975
because mass repatriation did not begin earlier than 1982.
Table 9 shows the educational composition of the refugee
workforce in 1975 which is worthy of note. The workforce
of the 56,200 political refugees consisted of 32,790 persons,
3,385 (10 percent) of whom were graduates of higher
education institutes, 4,434 (13.5 percent) were high school
or technical school graduates, and 11,595 (35.3 percent)
were graduates of occupational schools (specialised technical
schools). In addition, 11,320 (34.5 percent) had been
had been given vocational training and mostly consisted
of those political refugees who had been over 18 years old
upon leaving Greece and, due to their age and low educational
level, did not proceed to further education. 2,056 (6,2
percent) unskilled persons, were either disabled or older
people who did not achieve any vocational specialisation.
Table 8: Greek political refugees in 1975
Source: Kasimati, 1993a
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