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Suspect Area

From a series taken on Gyaros in the Cyclades group of islands, Greece.

Not very well known outside Greece, Gyaros is a deserted island used as a political prison during the right wing Greek Military junta rule between 1967 and 1974. It had been used as a prison prior to that going back as far as Roman times. During the second half of the 20th century a total of 22,000 political prisoners, both men and women, were sent there.

After the military regime was overthrown, it was used as a firing range and it was not until 1989 that it was declared a national monument so that this concentration camp would never be forgotten. This was to be a warning of the dangers of oppression but successive governments have largely ignored the prison, preferring to leave it to decay and be forgotten.

There is an annual pilgrimage of survivors and families of those who didn't survive, but, apart from that, it remains deserted and difficult to access.