Aris Velouchiotis - Death

Death

Velouchiotis moved again to the mountains of Central Greece in order to start an insurgency (see Greek Civil War) against the new government and the British allies who supported them. He was reported to have denounced the sell-out to the British in the "Varkiza Agreement" to lay down the National Resistance arms; particularly moving was the sight of his elite massed Mavroskoufides (Black Berets) openly mourning. He was outmanoeuvred by the KKE leadership and resolved to leave Greece; he repeatedly requested permission from the party to be allowed to be left to depart, but was refused.

His intention was to create a new ELAS and a National Independence Front (MEA). Though most of his associates abandoned him, he was reported to have continued to conduct guerrilla activities until June 1945. He was denounced by the KKE Central Committee and increasingly isolated, until he was ambushed with his unit in the mountain of Agrafa (some say that he was set up or even betrayed by KKE contacts) by para-military groups controlled by the Athens government. Although many members of the Security Battalions and the organisation X (leader of the X team was the Colonel, at the time, Georgios Grivas), who had collaborated with the German occupying forces, were rounded up and detained in prison, the majority of their officers were allowed to join the new Greek police force, organised by the British.

Aris and his second in command, Leon Javellas, were isolated by the main unit and finally he committed suicide with his comrade, either by a hand grenade or by a bullet. Rumors want him to "commit suicide with his commander Javellas when his thoughts were that there is no better future for his revolution".

The corpses of Velouchiotis and Javellas were subsequently decapitated, and the heads displayed, hanging from a lamp post in the central square of the town of Trikala. When British Labour government members of Parliament objected to the barbarity of the operation, they received the reply that the display was in accordance to an "ancient Greek war custom".

Following the rehabilitation in Greece of the EAM/ELAS and subsequently of the Communist party itself (after the end of the Greek military junta), busts and statues of Aris Velouchiotis have been erected in his native town; recently the KKE moved discreetly for Velouchiotis' rehabilitation, following in turn the expulsion of the KKE's wartime leader (who had denounced him), Nikos Zachariadis.