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Christodoulos Xiros has gone underground in Greece
Christodoulos Xiros, member of R.O 17N has escaped from prison-leave and gone underground in Greece
About 17N - Solidarity to Christodoulos Xiros Revolutionary Organisation 17th November (R.O 17N) was a leftist urban guerilla group, which operated in Greece from 1974 until 2002. It was dismantled after a string of arrests in 2002, which became part of a security crackdown just before the Athens Olympics in 2004. Until its dismantlement, the Marxist-Leninist 17 November was regarded as one of the world’s most dangerous revolutionary organisations and impregnable to multiple investigations. The operatives had good access to blackmarket weapons from post-soviet countries and practised very good tradecraft, this meant they remained undetected for a considerable amount of time compared to other radical left-wing revolutionary organisations like Red Army Faction in Germany and the Red Brigades in Italy. 17N used as its “signature weapons” two .45 M1911 semiautomatics in face-to-face assassinations. This early modus operandi was very successful. Later the group began campaigns of low-intensity property destruction and rocket attacks using stolen munitions and expedient materials.
17N were named after the day of the 1973 Athens Polytechnic uprising against the military dictatorship of 1967-74. The uprising was bloodily suppressed by the army. The group’s actions included weapon expropriations, 23 executions of cops, judges, journalists, politicians, Turkish, American & British agents, bombings and armed attacks against several capitalist, government and imperialist targets. In addition, 17N supported its operations with at least 11 bank robberies netting approximately US$ 3.5 million. Members of 17N kept detailed financial records, found in one of their safe houses in 2002, to document that the stolen money was used for revolutionary purposes.
17N’s first attack, on 23 December 1975, was against the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency’s station chief in Athens, Richard Welch. Welch was gunned down outside his residence by four assailants, in front of his wife and driver. Other victims included Captain William Nordeen USN, the U.S. defence attaché, whose car was destroyed by a car bomb a few metres from his residence on 28 June 1988, and U.S. Air Force Sergeant Ronald O. Stewart, who was killed by a remotely detonated bomb outside his apartment on 12 March 1991. 17N also killed the military attaché of the British Embassy, Brigadier Stephen Saunders, in Athens on 8 June 2000; Saunders was shot to death in a traffic jam as he drove to work.
On 29 June 2002 Greek authorities captured injured comrade Savvas Xiros, after a failed bombing attempt in Piraeus. A search of Xiros and torturous interrogation on the comrade after he had been severely injured by the explosive device he was carrying, led to the discovery of two safe houses and to the arrests of six more suspects.
A 58-year-old former mathematics student living underground since 1971, Alexandros Giotopoulos, was identified as the group leader and was arrested on 17 July 2002 on the island of Lipsi. On 5 September, Dimitris Koufodinas, identified as the group’s chief of operations, surrendered to the authorities after an extensive manhunt by anti-terror cops. In all, nineteen individuals were charged with some 2,500 offences relating to the activities of 17N. The trial of the terrorist suspects commenced in Athens in March 2003. Because of the 20-year statute of limitations, crimes committed before 1984 (such as the killing of CIA station chief Richard Welch) could not be tried by the court. On 8 December, fifteen of the accused, including A. Giotopoulos and D. Koufodinas, were found guilty; another four defendants were acquitted for lack of evidence. The convicted members were sentenced on 17 December 2003. Only five out of 19 members of the group convicted in 2003 are still in jail.
Christodoulos Xiros, 56, is one of the unrepentant imprisoned members of the group. Xiros has been sentenced to six times life sentence, plus 1000 years of prison. On the 6th of January the anti-terrorist unit announced that Christodoulos Xiros violated his 7th temporary permission to exit prison for a few days to visit his family in Halkidiki, and that he had escaped. Under current Greek law, inmates, who are serving life sentences, can be granted short-term leaves from prison after serving at least eight years of their term. Fragiskos Ragousis, Xiros’ lawyer, stated Xiros’ vanishing was “in line with his political action and his opinions on freedom”. Ragousis said he was not in contact with his client but interpreted his disappearance as “a political escape”. Anti-terrorist police started an immediate nationwide hunt, finding the car he used in the town of Florina, 200km away, but no further leads.
In the context of the anti-terrorist propaganda, the mainstream media unleashed an attack against the cell of imprisoned members of Conspiracy of Cells of Fire. The anti-terrorist unit had the journalists say that Christodoulos Xiros cooperated in his escape with the imprisoned members of the CCF. They claimed to have specific references that Christodoulos has found shelter at a safe house of unarrested members of CCF. At the same time, after a meeting of the Prime Minister with the Ministers of Public Order and Justice, they announced that there will be no further temporary permissions to leave prison for a few days, this is specifically for “terrorists” who “don’t regret their actions”, and in future the prison of Domokos will become a high security prison under police control with special forces of police (EKAM) at their disposal. All the political prisoners accused of participation in urban guerilla actions and other prisoners with long terms accused of organized crime will be transferred to Domokos. Large bounties were also announced for the capture of members of Revolutionary Struggle, Nikos Maziotis and Pola Roupa, plus rewards for information on the identities of members of armed groups who carried out an assassination of two members of neo-nazi group Golden Dawn. One hour later from the politicians emergency meeting, anarchist Kostas Sakkas was rearrested in a move widely viewed as an act of political revenge, although at a later date he was released on bail and prosecuted in a new anti-terror charge involving accusation of membership of CCF – which both Sakkas and the CCF deny. Furthermore, the antiterrorist unit called relatives of two comrades-members of CCF, to try to find out what they may know about the escape of Christodoulos Xiros. So far the cops used the situation to raid at least 60 houses of comrades in Athens and Thessaloniki, including members of the assembly of Anarchist Squat Nadir (Thessaloniki).
In the space of five days, panic-stricken authorities launched the biggest manhunt in modern times, placed a 4m Euro bounty on the head of Xiros - dead or alive - and threw a security cordon around the capital not seen since the 2004 Olympics.
As European justice ministers gathered for a summit in the country that currently holds the EU’s rotating presidency, there were police and military sharpshooters on the roofs, sniffer dogs roaming the streets and more than 2,000 riot police outside government offices and hotels.
A widespread panic gripped the national and foreign establishment, financial and security sector.
The U.S. State Department was furious. Anger in Washington added to the pressure on prime minister Antonis Samaras’s weak government to capture Xiros. The US State Department still regards 17 November as a proscribed terrorist organisation that was once on the top of its most wanted list before Al-Qaeda appeared. Xiros, to the dismay of authorities in Washington, secured several prison-leaves since 2011. Xiros’s ability to elude the authorities has inevitably also focused attention on a failing Greek state apparatus. Anti-terrorist units, like the judiciary, police, prison officers and politicians, have been sapped of morale by the country’s ongoing crisis and the defeats inflicted upon them by the new armed urban guerillas.
As the mainstream media were also drinking in the anti-terror hysteria once again, Alexandros Giotopoulos and Dimitris Koufodinas, imprisoned leading members of 17N, clarified with declarations that the 17N organisation had not reactivated with the escape of Xiros. Koufodinas recently released an autobiography with a major publishing company in Greece to much dismay by the establishment. 17N are still viewed favourably by many people in Greece and they are given respect. Western diplomats and business leaders are terrified that Xiros will try to forge a leading role among a new generation of guerrillas linked to a criminal underworld that is thought to be wellarmed and more inclined to internationalist anarchy, hence more unpredictable and nihilist.
For a new wave of global urban war - Solidarity to the unrepentant members of 17N and Chr.Xiros.