Greece’s police authorities have released further information concerning two parcel bombs sentinternationally via Greek courier firms, based on their investigation so far. All outgoing airmail
and parcel shipments from Greece are believed to remain suspended after international packages fromAthens carried by UPS and TNT were intercepted on Tuesday and found to contain explosivesubstances.The investigation has revealed that the parcel sent to the offices of German Chancellor AngelaMerkel had been given to a courier firm near Larisis railway station in Athens by an unidentifiedyoung man, according to Greek news service ANA-MPA. The sender of the package was given as theGreek finance ministry. The private courier firm then transferred the package to its own centralheadquarters so that it might undergo required security checks for suspect items and it was thentaken to the airport, where it was loaded onto an aircraft “operated by a private airline destinedfor Germany”.
CEP-Research understands it was delivered using UPS’s air and road express network to Merkel’soffices in Berlin, although UPS was unable to confirm this. It was dispatched from Greece on 31October and discovered at noon on Tuesday during a routine mail inspection at the Chancellery incentral Berlin, according to German government sources. Merkel was on a trip to Belgium at thetime.
The second package containing explosive substances that made it out of Greece was posted on thesame day, again by an unidentified young man, at the branch of another private courier firm basedin the west Athens district of Perissos. The package was ostensibly sent by a high-ranking memberof a Greek political party and addressed to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. TNT confirmedthat, following information from the Greek authorities, it identified the presence of a suspiciouspackage onboard one of its cargo aircraft, operating between Athens and the operator’s European airexpress hub in Liege, Belgium, and TNT Airways instructed the crew to divert to the nearestairport, Bologna in northern Italy. The package is understood to have been heading ultimately forRome.
The packages appear to be part of a wave of at least 10 explosive devices sent in parcels fromGreece’s capital over the last few days, including one to France’s President Nicolas Sarkozy, andseveral to embassies in Athens. They are believed to be the work of Greek left-wing extremists, andnot linked to last week’s high-explosive parcel devices from Yemen discovered within the UPS andFedEx air express networks.
Four people are understood to have been arrested over the attacks, including a suspected memberof Greece’s Conspiracy of Fire Nuclei group, which specialises in arson attacks on the offices andhomes of politicians. No-one has been seriously injured as a result of the parcel devices, althougha woman working at an undisclosed courier company was left with slight burns to her hand when aparcel intended for the Mexican embassy caught light.
