Nikaia is a suburb on the north-east of Piraeus, approximately 8 km from central Athens. Traditionally a working and lower-middle class area, Nikaia (known also as Kokkinia) was populated in the 1920s and 1930s by Asia Minor refugees following the disastrous end of Greece’s Asia Minor Campaign and the Greco-Turkish exchange of populations. The presence of people of Asia Minor descent is evident to this day.
One of the darkest hours in the history of modern Greece took place in Nazi-occupied Nikaia. In the infamous Roundup (Blocco) of Kokkinia in 17 August 1944 German officials and Greek Nazi collaborators rounded up and executed hundreds of men and women.
