Jailed terrorists used new recruits for parcel bombs

The parcel bombs sent last week to Berlin and Paris were dispatched by new members of the Conspiracy of the Cells of Fire who were recruited by jailed members of the guerrilla group, the Greek police’s (ELAS) counter-terrorism department believes.

According to a police investigation, the new recruits manufactured the crude explosive devices and sent them from post boxes in central Athens – rather than branches of Hellenic Post (ELTA) which have surveillance cameras – to German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble in Berlin and to the offices of the International Monetary Fund in Paris.

The convicted members of the guerrilla group in Attica’s high-security Korydallos Prison have access to the internet and cellphones, and are permitted to give interviews, thus broadening their circle of influence, a source at ELAS said.

The same source indicated that ELAS’s counter-terrorism unit has files on certain individuals who were involved in attacks or attempted attacks over the past year, including a bomb blast at the central Athens home of prosecutor Georgia Tsatani last October.

Authorities are also concerned that lax security in Greek jails are making it easy for convicted terrorists to continue directing followers from their cells. The prison wings are not properly guarded and there is no supervision of visitors to the convicts, a source at ELAS’s counter-terrorism unit told Kathimerini.