Red Terror (Greek: Ερυθρά or Κόκκινη Τρομοκρατία) is a term used by some historians to describe incidents of violence against civilians that were considered "traitors" by EAM (which was directed mainly by the KKE), because these civilians allegedly collaborated with groups (occupying forces, militia groups such as EDES, royalists etc) that wanted Greece to be under the political, economic and military influence of other foreign forces; either of Axis powers, from 1943 to 1944 or under British influence, from 1943 to 1949 and during the Greek Civil War.
The discourse about "red terrorism" was first formulated during the German Occupation as part of the anti-EAM propaganda of the occupying forces and their Greek collaborators.
In February 1944, when German occupying forces with Greek collaborators intruded an EAM base, a mass grave of non-communists was discovered near a Macedonian village.
[2] Three persons cooperating with a British intelligence network surveying German and Bulgarian occupation forces in Chalkidiki were executed, probably accused of acting against EAM.
[5] In January 1945 ELAS forces in Lakka of Souli in Epirus mass executed unarmed former resistance fighters of EDES, members of their families (including children and women), other civilians, totally 85 persons from the neighbouring villages.
Reference to "Red Terror" was made by the newly appointed Prime Minister of the Greek government-in-exile, Georgios Papandreou, in the Lebanon Conference (May 1944).
In April 1944 ELAS attacked the social-democratic resistance organization ΕΚΚΑ (the military wing of which was the 5/42 Evzone Regiment) that was commanded by Colonel Dimitrios Psarros.