Officers to be reassigned over Papademos bomb

Nearly a month after Lucas Papademos and two other people were hurt after the former prime minister opened a letter bomb in his car, the Greek Police (ELAS) is planning to relocate the officers who had been entrusted with checking his mail that day, Kathimerini understands.

According to well-informed sources, two officers who were supposed to put the envelope through Parliament’s x-ray machine are expected to be moved away from their posts. They are not only alleged to have not checked the envelope but to have lied in their testimony to counterterrorism officers, claiming that Papademos’s head of security had not given them any of the former premier’s mail to check.

Papademos, who served as prime minister from November 2011 to May 2012 and vice president of the European Central Bank from 2002 to 2010, was seriously injured on May 25 when the letter bomb exploded in his hands as he was being driven through central Athens. His driver and a member of his security detail sustained minor injuries in the blast.

In the days following the blast, there was confusion about how the letter had come into Papademos’s hands as police referred to two suspicious envelopes – one delivered to the former premier’s home and one to the Academy of Athens, of which he is president.

The Greek economist’s injuries were serious as he opened the letter on his lap, resulting in injuries to his legs, abdomen and hands.

The letter bomb was of similar composition of those sent in March to the offices of the International Monetary Fund in Paris and German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble in Berlin, according to police sources. The letter bomb sent to Paris detonated, leaving an IMF employee with minor injuries. The explosives in the letter sent to the ministry in Berlin were traced before it could reach Schaeuble’s desk.