Greek suicide over financial crisis
A cash-strapped Greek pensioner shot and killed himself outside parliament in Athens yesterday, saying he refused to scrounge for food in the rubbish, touching a nerve among ordinary Greeks feeling the brunt of the country’s economic crisis.
The public suicide of the 77-year-old retired pharmacist quickly triggered an outpouring of sympathy in a country where one in five is jobless amid tough austerity measures required as part of Greece’s international bailout.
A few hundred protesters marched into Syntagma square to pay tribute to the man.