[2][5] During World War II, her father refused to cooperate with the Nazi occupation government and closed down Kathimerini.

Soon after the coup had begun, Vlachos arrived at the offices of Kathimerini in the early hours of the morning, in complete shock, surprise and disarray, to plan the publication of what was to be the only edition of her newspaper during the dictatorship and started to organise the photographic and other recorded material which was to be included in that special edition.

[8][9] The next day, Vlachos, not willing to submit to the censorship demanded by the junta, decided to close down her newspapers and her magazine Eikones as a sign of protest against the dictators and their repressive measures.

[10] During a later interview titled Eleni Vlachou: A journalist remembers, with ERT, the national broadcast company of Greece, she said that by not responding to the junta pressure her "silence was her loudest voice".

[1] Despite her closing of her papers, she still went regularly to her office at the building of her publishing company where she frequently expressed her opinions against the junta.

[1][10][12][13][14][15][16][17] As far as the regime's strongman Georgios Papadopoulos was concerned, Vlachos told La Stampa that she feared him less than "going to the dentist".

[10][14][18][19][20] The interview to La Stampa proved too much for the dictators, who sent the police to her house to summon her to appear in front of the Athens Military Court where she was interrogated for four hours.

[14] Such attacks against the junta could have led to imprisonment or worse, yet she was not intimidated saying that should she ever go to jail she was expecting to be fed her favourite dish, which was meatballs.

She obtained a fake passport and dyed her hair black with shoe polish to match the false identification.

[1][26][27] Two days later she was on her way to London,[25] having successfully escaped from house arrest with the help of her friend Leslie Finer, an author who worked at the Greek Embassy in Washington and who arranged a secret British flight for her.

[3][5] In 1987 she sold Kathimerini to George Koskotas and in the 1990s she published her memoirs Peninda kai Kati: Dimosiographika Chronika (Fifty Something: Journalistic Chronicles), alluding to her more than sixty-year career in the newspaper business.

[11] In response to her death, the Prime Minister of Greece Andreas Papandreou said about her: "She was a truly great figure in Greek journalism... She was unwavering in her principles and her beliefs...

"[11] A prize named in her honour "The Eleni Vlachou Award" is presented every two years starting from 2003 to Greek journalists by the German embassy in Greece for excellence in journalism covering European and international topics.