ELA patient can go home
The only Revolutionary Popular Struggle (ELA) suspect to have admitted any link with the left-wing terrorist group yesterday secured release from pre-trial detention on the grounds of poor health. Athens architect Costas Tsigaridas, 64, whom police believe to have been the group’s top decision-maker, suffered a mild stroke on Sunday in his Korydallos Prison cell, where four ELA suspects have been held awaiting trial following their arrests in early February. He has since been in Evangelismos Hospital under heavy guard. But yesterday investigating judge Leonidas Zervobeakos accepted a plea for release submitted by Tsigaridas’s lawyer, setting bail at 20,000 euros. Tsigaridas has admitted «political responsibility» for ELA’s activities up to 1990, after which he claims to have retired. He has been charged with ELA membership and participation in a string of bomb attacks and attempted killings. A fifth ELA suspect, civil servant Michalis Kassimis, 58, has been charged but not detained.
