2 lawyers walk out of ELA trial
The trial of five suspected Revolutionary Popular Struggle (ELA) terrorists suffered a new delay yesterday when two defense lawyers stormed out after the court refused to dismiss evidence submitted by a prosecution witness. The trial was postponed until today, while the court appointed new lawyers for Irini Athanassaki. Two of her three initial counsels – the third was not in court yesterday – Dimitris Tsovolas, the chairman of the populist Democratic Social Movement (DIKKI), and Katerina Iatropoulou had earlier insisted that the court should reject as forgeries purported documents from the former East German secret police archives submitted by journalist Vassilis Zissis. Although the documents did not incriminate their client, whom Zissis claims was not an ELA member, Tsovolas and Iatropoulou threatened to walk out if the documents were admitted as evidence. Iatropoulou labelled Zissis «a secret agent.» The court, however, ruled that there was no reason to dismiss the evidence, with the exception of three or four documents for which there was no official translation.
