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Assailants fired shots with AK47 at Nea Dimocratia HQ – Bullet in Samaras’ office
Unknown assailants fired shots with a Kalashnikov rifle at the headquarters of government party Nea Dimocratia. The assault was so bold that even “a bullet was found in the office of ND leader and Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras”, so the police and the media. The attack took place at 3 o’clock on Monday morning.
Bullet hits window of PM Samaras office
Just 3 kilometers away police found a car in flames. Anti-terror department of police investigates links to the attack. The car was stolen in Metamorfosi suburb of north-west Athens and it was probably stolen the same night.
Bullet in PM’s office ostracized three times
According to Greek media, the assailants fired 9 shots from a distance of 70 meters opposite of ND headquarters, located in Kallithea suburb of south Athens, at Syggrou Avenue. The burnt out car was found at 3:10 am in Palaio Faliro suburb.
Nine AK47 cashings were found opposite the ND HQ
According too latest news from surveillance cameras, the assailants were two people who used most likely one rifle, while a third person was waiting inside the car. It looks as if the assailants :took a ride” in the ara, checking for security measures before they started the fire shots.
Video: raw footage from Samaras’ office
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Ballistic investigation is to answer the questions whether only one rifle was used and whether the Kalashnikov has been used previously in other crimes.
Video: Police removes the stolen and burnt out car
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There is suspicion that the assailants’ target was the party sign hanging outside the Nea Dimocratia HQ and that the bullet entered the PM’s office on the third floor of the building rather by “mistake”.
“According to eyewitnesses, two persons walked from a black car they have parked in a nearby street the ND HQ at 3 a.m. However the bulding security guards took notice of them and the suspects started to fire gunshots in the air and at the ND beofre they walkced back to their car.” (zougla.gr)
Police is due to make a statement calling on citizens to give information, in case they saw or hear something.
Nobody was injured as the building was empty at this time of the night.
Immediately after the attack strong police forces and anti-terror units rushed to the spot, while at the same time many question marks rise about the security measures of ND headquarters, especially after the series a total of 17 arson attacks during the last in the last three days, where even local ND branches became targets.
The attack occurred just one day after the firebomb at the home of government spokesman’s brother.
Political row
The attack shocked the political world and the Greek society but also sparked a new row between Nea Dimocratia and main opposition, left-wing SYRIZA.
“Democracy, New Democracy and the country’s Prime Minister Antonis Samaras cannot be terrorized,” said the secretary of ND’s political committee, Manolis Kefaloyiannis.
The spate of attacks, as well as police operations to clear squats in central Athens, have been at the center of a full-blown political row between the coalition parties and SYRIZA, which has been accused of having an equivocal stance on the use of violence – a charge that the leftists vehemently deny.
“The difference between inflammatory statements and inflammatory attacks is very small,” said Simos Kedikoglou early on Monday. “There has to be a clear denouncement of violence and verbal violence.”
Kedikoglou added that he had received threatening phone calls recently.
SYRIZA spokesman Panos Skourletis said the party’s condemnation of recent attacks was a “given”. He accused New Democracy of trying to polarize the political climate in order to draw attention from austerity measures and the state of the economy.
He referred to the assailants as “useful idiots” and said that ND was creating a “civil war climate.” (ekathimerini)
The attacks and the political row between right and left, revive ghosts of Greece’s political past, where the so-called “parakratos” – a paramilitary mechanism - was active in the twilight zone between democracy and dictatorship. Veteran left politician and SYRIZA MP, Manolis Glezos, told the Parliament this morning “It is unacceptable that ever time we are being considered quilty.” Giving a reply to ND accussations, Glezos wondered whether the assailants “were deep state organizations friendly to Nea Dimocratia. Nevertheless, the left has not benefits from these attacks.” (nonewsnews)
SYRIZA condemend the attacks in a statement speaking of “dangerous escalation of dead-end and blind terrorist violence.”
SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras called Antonis Samaras on Monday morning experessing his support and asking for a full and thorough investigation into the attack on ND’s headquarters.
2013-01-14 05:30:24
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