NEWS

Stolen van being checked for terrorist link

Forensics investigators on Thursday were scouring a van for any possible evidence that it is linked to a suspected jailbreak being planned by convicted November 17 terrorist Christodoulos Xeros before his recent recapture.

The white van, which had been reported stolen, was found on Thursday in the western Athenian suburb of Aegaleo and matches a vehicle described in a document, believed to detail the plan for the jailbreak, found in one of Xeros’s safe-houses.

Counter-terrorism officers believe Xeros and at least two more accomplices were hatching a plan to attack the Greek capital’s Korydallos Prison to help in the escape of convicted members of the urban guerrilla group Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire before they were transferred to a new maximum-security facility in central Greece.

Xeros, convicted to successive life sentences over six murders, was arrested after nearly a year on the run in Anavysos, southwest of Athens, on Saturday. He had escaped while on prison leave in early January last year.

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