Anti-terror chief heralds new arrests
The chief of Greece’s anti-terrorism squad, Lt. Gen. Stelios Syros, said yesterday that police had been gathering much evidence that will lead to arrests of suspected members of several terrorist organizations which operated from 1974 until today. The priority, Syros told the state-controlled Athens News Agency, will be the arrest of members of the Revolutionary Popular Struggle (ELA) group who are considered dangerous. The group began operating a few months before the November 17 organization claimed its first victim in December 1975. ELA was a broader based movement than November 17 and some of its members are reported to have been named in lists stemming from the archives of the defunct East German Stasi security service and other agencies. Syros’s comments, which were reported in indirect speech, were the most open so far regarding arrests beyond those of 15 November 17 suspects currently in pre-trial detention. He said that this week police would again question personal and professional acquaintances of Savvas Xeros, the confessed November 17 member who was injured in a bomb explosion on June 29 and whose testimony helped arrest many other suspected members. The agency said that the search for November 17 would focus on two women, an operative known by the code name «Parkinson» who allegedly took part in a robbery, a former art school graduate known as «Costas,» fugitive senior operative Dimitris Koufodinas, a woman known as «Anna» and another suspected senior member known as «Sardanapalos.» Syros told the ANA that lots of evidence had been found, a significant amount of which could provide proof, and that police would make arrests soon. He said that aside from November 17, police were focusing on ELA and other small groups which had operated sporadically, such as May 1. Judicial investigators and prosecutors are working almost without breaks to prepare the case against the November 17 suspects. They are racing to beat not only the 20-year statute of limitations on murder and 15-year one on other crimes but also the 18-month limit on detentions. Which means sentencing must be completed by January 2004.
